Gimme Shelter
by mamapranayama
Summary: Sometimes it's not the monsters or the ghosts that cause the biggest problems, but nature itself. preseries teenchesters with plenty of hurt!Sam and hurt!Dean to go around.
1. Chapter 1

_Happy New Year, Everyone!_

_Here's a story I wrote some time ago for the GenBigBang over on LJ and never did get around to publishing on this site. _

**Gimme Shelter**

Sam didn't want to be there – that much was perfectly clear by the way he scowled almost continually as they ran through the pelting rain and up to the door of the building before bursting inside.

It was like any old, haunted house that might appear in a b-horror movie, complete with crumbling Victorian architecture, gables, peeling paint. It even came complete with a night sky filled with lightning and dark, grey ominous clouds as an approaching storm bore down on them.

It was also the home of one Garwood Stephen Lackey III; a spoiled, rich teen and wannabe arsonist. He was shot and killed in this house over a hundred years ago when he tried to run from an angry mob of townspeople that were pissed over him setting fires to people's barns or some shit like that. Dean had only been half-listening to the back-story, but he had gotten the gist of it from Dad and Sam so that was enough for him to be on board with wasting this ghost.

Also, like any supposedly haunted house, it was a magnet for stupid teenagers daring each other to spend the night there. They had more than likely roused the kid's spirit and riled him up enough to seek some sort of revenge on the trespassers – either that or the ghost was still pissed at his parents for naming him 'Garwood' and just wanted to spread the misery.

Normally, this sort of job was small potatoes for the Winchester's and Dad didn't often entertain such piddly hunts for ghosts unless lives were being threatened, but one of those moron kids landed his ass in the hospital after he said he was pushed down a flight of stairs in the house and it suddenly became their kind of case. And since they had been nearby at the time that report came out, Dad felt it was worth looking into – an easy job to keep them all sharp before they left town and found something bigger to tackle.

They all came together in the Impala since Dad's truck was in dire need of a new radiator. Dad was off at the cemetery to dig up Garwood's bones after he dropped Sam and Dean off at the house. Though Dean didn't necessarily like the thought of being stuck in that house without a car to run to, he was mollified by the fact that all he and Sam had to do was make sure that the spirit was well and truly gone and that nothing of the kid's remains had been left behind in the house to keep him hanging around. After that, their Dad would be back to pick them up and they could all go back to the motel and relax with a few beers and some brainless television.

It was easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy as far was Dean was concerned. All except that Sam was being a total dick about the whole thing.

He had mumbled something earlier about needing to read Shakespeare or something for school, but Dean couldn't understand why anyone would want to read that shit over icing a spirit – that Old English crap didn't make sense anyway and Shakespeare had been dead for like a thousand years, so it wasn't like the guy was really writing about anything relevant to their job.

Besides … they were going to be out of this town in a week when Sam's school was out for the summer, so what did it really matter if he finished reading freaking _Hamlet_ or not?

Still, for some reason school was important to Sam. Dean was almost sure that it wasn't so much that Sam liked reading Shakespeare so much as it was that he hated to fail – as if failing at school was Sam's worst nightmare – kinda like Dean's worst nightmare would be to be trapped somewhere and forced to listen to Korean pop music. He shuddered just thinking about that and tried to distract himself by humming the chorus to _Seek and Destroy_.

Then again, his worst nightmare was far worse than that. His true worst nightmare was that he'd turn around one day and Sam wouldn't be there. He'd done it before – run away – even so far as flippin' Flagstaff when he was fourteen and Dean had had to search for nearly two weeks to find him that time. And he knew Sam was itching to get out of hunting – to get away from their life. He just hoped that Sam would come around at some point and actually want to stay, but Dean wasn't holding his breath. Even though Sam still had a year to go in high school he still found himself twisted in knots knowing that the day when he'd wake up and Sam would be gone might soon be approaching.

His humming intensified.

By his side, Sam shot him a glare and his frown deepened so much that Dean wondered how it was even possible for his face to stretch like that without permanent damage. "What?" Dean asked.

"Seriously, do you have to keep humming like that? We're supposed to be getting rid of the ghost, not annoying him."

"Please … even the dead can appreciate Metallica."

As predicted, Sam rolled his eyes and snorted, "I don't think they would agree if they had to spend eight hours a day in a car with you for the past seventeen years."

"Have I ever mentioned how much of a whiny bitch you are?"

Sam smirked, letting sarcasm drip into his voice, "Gee … that's a new one, Dean. Maybe you should go ahead and call me Samantha next … ya know, just to round out the clichés."

Dean grumbled under his breath – okay, maybe he had used those insults a bit much lately, but if the shoe fits the ginormous foot …

Lightning flashed through the dirty windows and illuminated the interior of the foyer followed by a clap of thunder so loud it shook the foundation of the house.

"Dean …" Sam suddenly whispered, grabbing his jacket sleeve and pointing, "Look—"

Dean directed his sight to the top of the grand staircase where Sam was pointing and almost did a double take. Dad had said that the kid was young – almost Sam's age, and with a name like Garwood, he imagined that the kid would be puny with glasses and acne, but he hadn't been expecting the ghost to look so much like his little brother. He was a floppy-haired kid with long, gangly limbs, but unlike Sam, he was wearing turn-of-the-century style clothes and glared down at them from the top of a stairwell with a malicious glint in his dead eyes made all the more disturbing by another flash of lightning casting shadows on his pale, grey face.

Dean and Sam raised their shotguns almost simultaneously and blew the spirit away just as it started to advance on them.

"I guess Dad hasn't burned the bones yet." Dean mused out loud.

"Ya think? We just got here, Dean." Sam groused back, sounding pissy enough for Dean to want to smack him upside the head, "We all should have gone to the cemetery then come back here together to make sure this kid is gone – it's stupid splitting up."

Dean knew Sam was just letting his worry come through as anger, but the bitching was getting to be almost more than Dean could take, "You think you can stop complaining for two minutes, huh? Dad can take care of himself and has been digging graves since you were still crapping in your diapers. Besides, it's a Friday night and prime-time for bored, stupid morons to come out here and dare each other to do stupid things like visit a haunted house and get themselves killed. We're keeping them out until the job's done – in the meantime, why don't you do something useful for a change and help me see if this kid left any bits and pieces of himself behind that need to be taken care of."

Sam sighed truculently, itching to keep up the argument, "You really believe that? Who would be coming out here in this weather? It's just an excuse, Dean. It's like he doesn't trust me not to screw up and have your backs and he wants you to babysit me. Why else would he have us all come out and then take off on his own? I mean – he wants me to hunt and put my homework on the back burner, but he doesn't want me to actually do anything even remotely useful. I just wish he would make up his damned mind, ya know?"

"It's called having a little faith in the man, Sam! Sometimes you just have to trust that he's in charge and knows what he's doing without questioning his every move – Jesus!"

Actually, Sam had a point. The last hunt all three of them had been on together ended up going to the deep south when Sam's shotgun jammed and Dean got thrown into a wall leaving him with a mild concussion. Dean didn't really blame Sam for that, even though he moaned about the headaches it had given him for days, but Dad had come down pretty hard on Sam – ordering him into extra marksmanship training and making him clean each weapon every night before he could go to bed. This was the first hunt Dad had let Sam do more than just research on in weeks.

Sam shook his head, fuming, but walked off without any further moaning over Dad's decisions. Dean couldn't say he was too upset that Sam had put a little distance between them as he went off to explore the house in the opposite direction.

Dean reached into his pocket and pulled out his MacGyver'd EMF detector he had fashioned out of an old Walkman and started scanning the place with the headphones over his ears. Besides the brief appearance of Garwood's ghost, the place was mostly silent until another round of lightning and thunder echoed across the walls accompanied by increasingly strong gusts of wind that rattled the windows and shook the walls. Dean rounded a corner and found himself in a large, open living area with no furnishings save a couple of moth-eaten curtain on only one window and an empty fireplace. He moved on and found himself in the kitchen next. There cupboards were bare and the doors to the cabinets were missing. The only thing that really stood out to him was a door which he assumed was a pantry, but when he opened it, found it led to a staircase going down into the basement.

He shined his flashlight down the stairs and was half-tempted to venture down there on his own, but held off, knowing it would be smarter for him and Sam to explore that part of the house together.

Out of the corner of his eye and from the other side of the room where the kitchen met with the foyer, Dean saw Sam beginning to climb the stairs towards the second story, his flashlight's beam bouncing up and down as he ascended. He was almost to the top of the stairs when Dean decided that he probably shouldn't wander too far on his own and went to follow him. Even though Sam had just complained about Dean needing to babysit him, it was still a haunted house and bad shit happened when ghosts were involved and he'd be damned if he was going to let Sam get hurt.

Dean had just reached the steps when the room was aglow with lightning once again, practically blinding him in its intensity. Above him, a shotgun blast reported just as more thunder boomed and shook the earth. Dean looked up just in time to see Garwood dissipate in a cloud of vapor.

Sam shouted above the din as he charged the rest of the way up, "That's twice he's shown up on the stairs, Dean. He must be guarding something up there."

Dean had to race up the steps to catch up to Sam and met him at the landing. On either side of the brother were two halls; one going left and one going right, "Okay, so now which way?" Dean wasn't sure why he even bothered to ask since he knew what Sam had in mind.

"We split up," Dean groaned hearing those words from Sam's mouth; that was the last thing he wanted to do, "It makes sense – you go left, I go right and whichever way the ghost shows up again is probably where whatever it is he's guarding is at."

"Stupid plan, Sam." Dean grumbled, but knew his brother was right and turned to go down the hallway to the left while Sam went in the opposite direction.

Even through the thick walls of the hallway, Dean could hear the wind and rain outside lashing against the house in a frenetic chorus of whistles and increasingly louder thunder claps, sounding more and more like a freight train might come barreling through the place at any moment.

Dean thought of his Dad out in this storm and shivered, wishing they had checked the weather reports before heading out – John Winchester was a tough sonuvabitch, but even he would have trouble getting through this weather and he just hoped he was okay and not taking any stupid chances.

OoOoOoOo

The rain beating against the windshield was becoming bothersome as John drove down the twists and turns of the cemetery road. Sure, storms made it far easier to get into a graveyard unnoticed by the cops, but it also brought its own set of additional problems – the first and foremost being just getting there in the first place.

It was difficult enough to see where he was going, but the constant lightning flashes screwing with his night vision only made things worse and the going that much slower. It took him nearly half of an hour, but finally he found the older section of the cemetery and stopped the car near the family plot he was looking for.

The second thing about digging graves in this kind of weather that really made things more difficult was the actual digging part itself. While John was far too proud and macho to admit how miserable getting wet out in the storm made him, it was trying to unearth a grave while water kept filling in the hole that really got on his nerves and he wished now that he had taken a few minutes to look up the weather reports before taking on the job that night.

He also had to admit that things probably would have gone a lot faster if he had taken his boys with him, but John had his reasons for leaving them behind. Ghosts were notorious for showing up whenever you tried to destroy what was left of their earthly remains and he could handle one teenaged spirit on his own – sometimes he wished it was that easy with his own teenager.

His other reason for leaving them behind was for Sam to learn his lesson. Dean had almost had his head caved in the last time he brought Sam along all because the boy had forgotten to clean his weapon thoroughly and let the damned thing get jammed when he needed it the most. Sam needed to learn to be a team player and to put the hunt first and he hoped that making him clear that house with his brother might ease him back into a hunting mode with a minimal amount of danger – something easy that he could do in his sleep to remind him that hunting could be rewarding and maybe even a little fun if he would just stop complaining about it.

John wasn't overly optimistic that it would work and it was probably not the best of his training plans for the kid, but he had tried everything else to get Sam motivated to hunt and so far, nothing was working. Besides, maybe if Sam thought that John didn't trust him to come along to the graveyard, then maybe that would light a fire under his ass and make him want to hunt with more enthusiasm. Well … it was worth a shot anyway.

John was completely soaked and had to brace himself against the fierce winds battering him as he finally reached the top of the coffin. He breathed heavily and panted from the effort and digging the grave by himself had left him exhausted. His aching joints and muscles felt the need to remind him that he wasn't in his twenties anymore and that he should probably take break, but just as a flash of lighting lit up the dark sky like daytime, he looked up and saw_ it_.

He cursed as the winds picked up and tried to push him over. Reaching into his pocket, he reached for his cell phone then cursed again when he flipped it open and the damned thing failed to turn on - it was soaked and utterly useless.

He had no way to warn the boys of what was coming – he needed to work faster.

OoOoOoOoOo

Sam walked cautiously down the hall, shotgun in one hand and flashlight leading the way in the other. Except for the lightning illuminating the way through the window at the end of the hall, it was black as pitch and eerily deserted.

At one point this house was a family's home – well maintained, lavishly decorated with ornately carved crown molding, stained glass windows, patterned tin ceilings, and expensive wallpapering. But now – now it was a shell – an empty husk made of rotting wood, peeling paint, broken windows, and abandoned, dusty furniture. It wasn't a home anymore – it was just a crumbling house.

For some reason this observation made Sam kind of sad. He'd never had a permanent house and had spent his entire life living out of rented shacks, motel rooms, and the backseat of the Impala, but he never felt homeless – he had Dean and Dad and while sometimes their lives were anything but normal or easy, and maybe it was hard to get along with his demanding father, it was a family that really, truly made a place home. And that's what this house now lacked – a family to fill it – and all that was left was the ghost of a troubled kid -no wonder he was so angry and vengeful; his existence had to be soul-crushingly lonely.

Sam knew about loneliness. Sometimes, even in his tight-knit little family, he felt like the odd-man out – like he was a third, useless wheel attached to the sturdy framework of the team his brother and father made. It wasn't that he hated hunting –okay – maybe he did hate it, but not because he didn't see the benefits of it. He knew hunting saved people's lives and that was a good thing, but the costs were pretty freakin' high. Too many times his father or brother had come so close to dying and each time he had to patch one of them up or worry and fret when they didn't come back on time or call him for days when they left him behind to hunt something. It was enough to make him want to have no part of it anymore – to take off and leave just so he wouldn't have to see either of the two people he loved the most lose their lives before his eyes.

Maybe it made him selfish to want out – to want a little peace, but wasn't that what normal people wanted? He couldn't understand how vengeance could drive a person like his father to abandon that desire to be safe and take up this kind of life – perhaps he never would—perhaps that's why he and Dad never really saw eye-to-eye on much of anything; their goals were too different and while Dad wanted to pull him in one direction, Sam wanted to go the other and never in the middle could they ever meet.

Another crash of lightning and roll of thunder shook the rafters of the house and snapped Sam out of his wandering thoughts and back into the task at hand. He turned around and looked back in the direction Dean had taken and saw his brother walk cautiously into a room, disappearing from his view. Sam didn't like being split up any more than Dean did, but the sooner that got this over with, the sooner they could all go back to the relative safety of their latest motel room and he could lose himself in the pages of _Hamlet_ and forget about what the next day may bring for just a little while.

An open door to Sam's left beckoned. He moved with steady alertness through the opening and found himself in what could have been someone's bedroom at one time. A broken bedframe sat in one corner minus its mattress, while the only other piece of furnishing in the room was an old wardrobe with broken doors hanging off of rusty hinges. Sam swept the room with his flashlight when he was momentarily blinded by a flash of lightning streaking through the tattered, moth-eaten curtains over the windows.

Before he could regain his night vision an unseen force collided with Sam's chest and sent him flying backwards with a lung-emptying crash into the wall, his shotgun and flashlight ripped from is hands and skittering across the floor as his head cracked resoundingly into the plaster.

With the wind knocked out of his lungs, Sam fell to his knees and struggled to restart his breathing, forcing his eyelids to remain open as black spots crowded his vision and threatened to pull him under into oblivion. A spike of merciless pain assaulted his head, but there was no time to licks his wounds just yet – he needed the shotgun that lay on the floor just a few feet away so he could blast away the spirit that was quickly closing in on him.

Too slow to reach his gun in time, Garwood was suddenly upon him, wrapping his thin, cold, dead fingers around Sam's throat and cutting off his already depleted supply of oxygen.

"Stay out!" The ghost kid hissed, "It's mine!"

Sam couldn't really grasp what the boy was saying past his own need for air and struggles to pry hands from his neck. Things were getting darker with each thudding heartbeat in his chest when a loud bang filled the room and shook the walls.

Suddenly the pressure on Sam's windpipe was gone and he gulped in huge gasps of much needed and blessedly free air into his starved lungs. His throat and head ached miserably, but he could breathe and looked up gratefully at Dean who stood in the doorway, lowering his still smoking shotgun.

"Sam!" Dean was at his side a moment later, helping his to sit up. Sam rubbed the back of his head, feeling the rising lump under his fingers. There was no blood at least and while he might have a headache for the rest of the evening – which kinda put his desire to read Shakespeare that night on hold – he didn't think he was concussed.

Dean was harder to convince, and raised his hand spreading out his fingers, "How many fingers, Sammy?"

"This many," Sam replied, raising his middle finger, "And don't call me Sammy, jerk."

"Very funny, jackass." Dean sighed, helping Sam to his feet and relieved that he appeared to be more or less intact.

"Thanks." Sam said once he was stable and certain he wouldn't fall over, expressing his gratefulness at Dean's last-second save. Any longer and Sam would probably be up in the clouds learning how to play the harp with the angels.

"No problemo." Dean replied, looking about the room, "I'm guessing this must be the kid's room."

"Yeah … he certainly didn't want me in here. I'm guessing that there's something in here he doesn't want us getting at. We should look around before he decides to come back."

"Yeah … I'm gonna call Dad and see if he's toasted the kid's bones yet. If he has, then we know that there's for sure something here keeping him tied to the place."

Sam nodded and started searching while Dean fished out his phone and dialed. Sam looked under the bed frame and found nothing but dust bunnies. The closet was empty and when he looked through the wardrobe there was nothing to be found in there either. It wasn't until he bent over with a grunt and looked under the dresser that he saw something that caught his eye – a loose floor board that looked as if it had been pried up and shoved back into place many times over.

Standing up again, Sam went to the side of the wardrobe and pushed it until the floorboard was exposed. He went to his knees and saw scratches where something had been used to pry the board up. He reached into his pocket for his knife, flicking it open then inserting it between the seams and wedging it like a lever to force the board to rise up. It came up easily as there were no nails holding it in place and he was able to completely remove it and see what lay underneath it. Inside the little hole that had been created in the floor, Sam found a small, dusty, and decaying cigar box.

Carefully, Sam pulled the box from its hiding place and laid it on the floor in front of him as he sat back on his heels and opened the lid to peer inside. A box of matches, a couple of pocket knives, and a small, paper-bound notebook were stuffed inside.

A shadow came over Sam and he glanced up quickly, worried for a second that Garwood was back to attack him for prying into his personal belongings, but it was only Dean standing above him with a deep frown on his face.

"What's wrong?" Sam asked.

"Dad's not answering his phone. It could just be the storm messing with the reception and I'm sure he's fine, but ..."

Sam felt a lump of concern grow in his stomach, as he looked out the window beside him that rattled in its frame from the onslaught of wind and rain, "He's okay, Dean. You know Dad ... he's probably too focused on getting the job done to answer."

Dean nodded and also chanced a worried glance out the window. The storm seemed to be getting worse with more and more lighting and even fiercer gales that howled and whistled angrily through the walls. The whole house now vibrated constantly and so much so that Sam was starting to get a prickling feeling of unease knowing that their father was out in that.

Dean shifted his attention to the box in front of Sam's knees, "What's that?" he asked.

"Found it under the floor," Sam answered, reaching inside and pulling the contents out. There wasn't really anything special to the matches or knives – no human remains or blood visible on any of them, so Sam went next to the notebook and turned to the first page. The paper was dry and brittle, crackling as he leafed through the pages, but Sam was more interested in the words he found scrawled inside. It was a journal, filled with the deeply personal and disturbing thoughts that Garwood hid from the rest of the world.

Sam read with fascination and growing sympathy. Garwood was clearly a kid with serious emotional problems that he expressed in his words – how he felt that no one understood him – how his father never showed him any attention except to demand that he follow him into the family business, and how starting fires had given him sort of release and sense of control over his life. While Sam didn't think that arson was a good emotional outlet, he could identify with the kid's feelings of isolation and struggles to follow his own ambitions.

In the final and most angst-ridden entry, some of the words were smeared and the page was more wrinkled than the rest like something wet had been splashed across the page. That's when it hit him. It wasn't water that caused the damage … it was tears long-since dried, but a biological piece of Garwood that could be keeping him tied to the living world.

"I think this is it, Dean." Just as soon as Sam finished saying that, Garwood was back, this time appearing behind Dean and before he could warn his brother, the ghost struck and knocked him upside the head, knocking him to the floor.

"Dean!" Sam shouted, quickly pocketing the book then springing up to dive for his shotgun while cursing himself for not having grabbed it sooner.

"It's mine! Give it back!" Garwood shouted, his voice echoing above the din of the storm raging outside. Sam rolled and had the shot gun wrapped around his fingers, pointing and firing in one fluid motion. The spirit vaporized with an unearthly and angry screech.

Huffing, Sam darted for Dean who was groaning and struggling to his hands and knees. He grabbed his brother's arm, "You okay?"

"Guh … _shit _… "Dean shook his head like he was clearing the cobwebs out, "I'm fine. Where's that damned book, Sam?"

"I got it."

"Good … let's burn that mother already."

Sam couldn't have agreed more and helped haul his brother back up to his feet while grabbing their weapons. Sore and groaning over their fresh hurts, Sam and Dean stumbled and leaned against each other as they headed out of the dark room, back down the hall and descended the stairs, heading for the living room where a fireplace that had stood cold and empty for decades waited for them.

Sam wearily tossed the book into the pit while Dean produced a shaker of salt and coated the thing with the fine crystals. Lighter fluid wasn't needed as the pages quickly started to burn the moment the flame from Sam's lighter touched the dried paper. Smoke curled and billowed from the pages as the words written in ink disappeared, turning into black ashes.

For half a second all was quiet as Sam and Den stared at the flames but all too soon the silence was shattered by the distant sound of a siren that was quickly muted again by the noise of heavy rain, wind and now hail careening into the decaying structure.

"What is that?" Sam asked and they both perked their heads up, trying to identify the far-off noise that was being obscured by the wailing winds and booming thunder.

"Crap," Dean groaned as though it finally registered with him what that noise was and at the same time a dawning realization crept over Sam as well – he'd heard that sound before and given the fact that they were in the plains of Oklahoma in early summer during a terrible storm, he really shouldn't have been all that surprised to hear it.

"Is that a tornado siren?"

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Above the noise, sirens began to whoop and blare, warning all those within earshot to seek shelter.

John tried to ignore that wind roaring around him as he pried open the lid of the coffin just enough for him to toss on some salt and lighter fluid without the rain getting into the interior and making it impossible to set on fire.

He propped the lid open with a stick while still inside the grave then set about trying to get his lighter to produce fire while all the time chaos erupted around him. Hail began to pelt him, some as large as golf balls bouncing across the lid of the coffin and slamming into his back, shoulders, and head hard enough to leave welts.

Even though the lighter was designed to be resistant to wind and water, the damned thing refused to stay lit as he was lashed at from all directions by the murderous storm.

The trees above him swayed and leaned, and John could hear them beginning to crack under the pressure even above the noise and cacophony. Limbs began to snap and debris tossed about, flying through the air, as they were sucked up into the atmosphere.

John's heart fluttered then pounded – he had to get these damned bones lit – he had to get back to the car – get back to his boys. He looked up again and swore bitterly at the giant, approaching wall of deadly clouds that were illuminated by the bolts of lightning striking far too close for comfort.

He worked more frantically with the lighter, flicking it over and over to no avail. The ground began to shake and John popped his head out of the grave long enough to see trees only a quarter of a mile away being pulled from the ground, some completely uprooted before they became airborne. On the upside, the sinister funnel of destruction seemed to be making a turn, but not in the direction he had been hoping – it was heading straight in the direction of the house where he had left his sons.

Heart in his throat, John rolled the flint of the lighter once again setting off a spark that finally ignited the butane and stayed alight.

It was also in that second of triumph that a blinding crash of pain exploded in his head some hard and solid connected with the back of it and sent him sprawling into the grave and plunging into him darkness.

OoOoOoOoOo

No sooner than Dean and Sam had identified the tornado sirens, the walls of the old house began to shake and shimmy in earnest. The ground vibrated in time to the roar outside when suddenly the sounds of shattering glass burst into the cavernous room.

"Shit!" Dean exclaimed,

Sam didn't argue with that sentiment. If there was a tornado, of which there didn't seem to be any doubt anymore, it was getting closer by the second, increasing with fury and merciless strength. Gale force winds broke even more windows and sent sheets of rain and large pellets of hail in through the exposed openings, causing both boys to cover their faces.

Dean grabbed Sam's arm, tugging on his sleeve, "C'mon … we gotta get to the basement!" He shouted as loud as he could, almost unable to hear his own voice above the noise.

Sam for once, didn't question that logic and they both hurried to search of better shelter and protection from the wrath of nature bearing down on them.

Wind whipping their hair as more windows blew out, Dean kept a firm grip on his brother, unwilling to let him go or lose contact with him in all of the chaos erupting around them as he pulled his brother towards the kitchen and the door he recalled there that led to the underground.

The wooden planks of the walls groaned ominously while above them sharp cracking sounds issued and called out the death knell of the roof as it began to tear from the rafters. In one felled swoop and gust of fury, the sky was suddenly open to them, tearing debris up into the clouds and pelting them both with rain, hail and flying lumber.

Dean felt along the wall, one hand clenching his brother while the other grabbed for purchase along a chair rail and held on like a vice grip. He inched them along, demanding his feet to pull them faster while the pull of gravity relinquished its hold on him and a mighty suction attempted to hoover him up like he was a piece of lint on the floor.

Sam's arm came around Dean from behind him with equal pressure as his body pushed him forward from behind and for once, Dean was glad his brother had started to outmatch him in size if not in strength as he gave him the stability he need to take one more step forward and reach the door.

Dean had to feel his way forward– the wind, hail too furious for him to see. At last, his fingertips felt a door and he could only pray this door led to the basement and their only hope of crawling out of this intact. As soon as he turned the knob, the door flung open and nearly took him and Sam with it, but with one look at the rickety staircase that led down into the shadows of the house's underbelly, he felt that had finally caught a break.

Clinging to the railing, Dean and Sam fought their way down until they came to yet another door. Dean hurriedly opened it as Sam pushed him past the threshold and they both turned as one to push against the raging wind and shut it.

Black as pitch, there was nothing to be seen.

Dean couldn't even hear his own breathing over the caterwauling of the winds, but they were both safe – at least that's what he thought until the ceiling above began to groan and shake followed by a loud crash as the whole house fell in on top of them.

To Be Continued ...


	2. Chapter 2

**_Hello everyone! I hope everyone's new year is off to a great start and _****_I apologize for being such a lazy-ass and not responding to all of your reviews, but I really do appreciate them all! I hope this next chapter doesn't disappoint._**

**Part Two**

John's head pounded furiously in his skull as stinging raindrops flicked at his eyelids and drew him out of the inky blackness. A groan slipped out of his lips while he forced uncooperative hands to push against solid, smooth wood and raise his upper body up.

His eyes slowly opened and gazed about in a daze of confusion. He was soaked to the bone; his feet buried up to his shins in thick mud while the rest of him lay sprawled over the top of a coffin. John reached up and felt the back of his head, pulling away his hand to see it smeared with bright, red blood. Sluggish memories began to surface and images of flying trees and the silhouette of a vicious funnel of destruction against a lightning bright sky flashed across his mind's eye.

The wind had died down to a stead breeze and while it still continued to rain and thunder, he was certain that the worst of it had passed, but just as he realized that, he remembered the direction the tornado appeared to be heading.

He shot up with a start, causing a spike of agony to bury itself in his brain and his vision to darken temporarily. Steeling his resolve, he willed the dizziness to abate – he had to get to Sam and Dean.

Standing up while stuck in the muck, John swayed precariously, grabbing the edge of the coffin beside him for stability. That's when he was reminded that he still had a job to do and a fire to start.

He was torn between finishing the salt and burn or bolting for his kids. It was impossible to say whether or not they had been in the path of the tornado or not. If they were still in that derelict, old house, who knows what could have happened to them if it had been hit, but on the other hand, the storm could have missed them completely and they might still be in danger if he didn't burn the bones.

John only needed to mull it over for a heartbeat before he started looking around for his lighter.

Unfortunately, it was nowhere to be found.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

It was dark.

When he first opened his eyes, he wondered if he had suddenly gone blind, but when he tried to raise his hand so he could wave across his face and confirm whether or not he was truly blind or if it was just extremely dark, he found he couldn't move it – he couldn't move anything at all.

There was pressure all around him, compressing every inch of his body and making it harder and harder to breathe with each inhale. A sinking feeling of dread washed over him as he realized he was trapped – crushed under the weight of a house he now remembered had fallen on him and he was immediately awash in a sea of panic.

And what of his brother?

Every part of his body constricted in fear while adrenaline flooded his veins and supplied his muscles with renewed power and super-charged strength. His fear then fed into his galloping heart as his muscles constricted tightly and he pushed, unsure of which was up and which way was down, but it didn't matter so long as he could get himself free enough to where he could climb out from the wreckage on top of him.

His hands found themselves wrapped around something solid he could push against. He let out a curse and an animalistic shout as he heaved with every ounce of his strength, cording muscles until he was sure they might snap.

At last, something moved above him and the pressure lightened significantly. He grunted, sweated and pushed then pushed some more until whatever was obstructing his head came loose and shifted, sliding away from him. His face was struck by wet drops of rain that felt like heaven on his skin and he could see clouds, dark and foreboding slipping across the sky above him.

Lightning streaked across the darkness above and made him wince in its intensity, but proved to him that his was indeed not blind – he had only been buried.

He struggled to get the rest of his body to freedom, grabbing onto anything he could get his hands on to pull him from the debris that attempted to smother him. His fingers found a cool, piece of metal – a rod of some sort for him to hold onto and he thanked his father for making him do so many chin ups during their training as he pulled his upper body up and freed his legs enough to crawl his way out the rest of the way.

Collapsing in a heap, he gulped in as much air as his lungs could hold while his over-fatigued muscles in his arms shook like Jell-O in an earthquake.

The wind whistled over his head and distant thunder filled his ears, but otherwise everything was still and silent.

He rolled onto his stomach, searching to see some sign of his brother, but there was nothing but fallen timbers, loose bricks, and piles of plaster surrounding him.

His heart thumped wildly in his chest as he cried out, praying for an answer, "SAMMY!"

OoOoOoOo

John gave up trying to find the lighter – he must have lost it when whatever it was struck him in the head and it was probably hopelessly buried in the mud surrounding his feet.

All he had left to start a fire was a waterproof book of matches from an MRE meal that had been in his jacket pocket for months.

He wasn't even sure they would even strike a spark much less light for long enough to start a fire, but it was all he had and he had to try.

He cursed when he opened the matchbook and found that there were only two matches left – two tries to burn those bones and John wasn't holding out much hope that he'd get even one lit.

His hand shook as he propped open the coffin lid again and ripped out the first match.

Scraping the match against the sandpaper strip, John held his breath as it sparked ... then promptly blew out.

OoOoOoOoOo

Dean shouted again, calling his brother's name repeatedly until he was hoarse. Various aches and pains announced their presence and throbbed across his body, and a trickle of blood from the top of his head trailed down his right eyelid, irritating the eye underneath. But he had no intention of nursing any of those wounds until he found Sam.

A voice startled him from behind and he whipped his head around, hoping it was Sam's but immediately realized that it was not.

Garwood Steven Lackey III marched right over to him, his face twisted in rage and righteous fury, "You stole my book, destroyed my house!"

Dean's eyes darted about for anything to defend himself with, but all he had at hand was an iron rod that was too wedged within the debris for him to free in time to use. His shotgun gone and muscles weak, there was little he could do to fend off the advancing spirit and before he could get to his feet, Garwood was on top of him, wrapping his fingers around Dean's throat and squeezing with crushing force against his windpipe.

Dean batted feebly at Garwood's hands, but that only enraged his attacker more and increased the constriction. No air could get through and Dean felt rather than saw the encroaching darkness.

OoOoOoOoOo

This was his last chance.

John tried to steady his hand as he struck his final match and this time when it lit, he wasted no time tossing it into the coffin and onto the kerosene soaked bones .

Flames sprouted immediately, sheltered by the lid of the half-open casket, but John didn't wait around to watch it burn – he was too busy pulling himself out of the mud and racing to the car so he could find his boys to care.

OoOoOoOoOo

Flames erupted in front of Dean's dimming vision followed by a howling wail. The pressure let up on his throat and he gasped hungrily for air, rubbing his aching throat and coaxing it to relax and let him breathe fully once again.

His lungs burned with new oxygen, but he really didn't care how he had come out of that predicament – Sam was still lost and he needed to find him.

His burning throat did little to allow the lump growing in there to shrink as he scanned the wreckage and didn't know where to start.

"Sammy!" he yelled, unable to get more than a squeak out, "Please …"

Only silence and a rolling clap of thunder answered him.

Tears blurred his eyes – what if he was too late?

Dean closed his eyes, panting harshly and wheezing, "Please …" he prayed. Dean was not the type to get down on his knees, clasp his hands together and beseech the heaven's for help, but this time, he came close, hoping for a miracle and chanting over and over again his pleas for mercy.

His prayer was answered the moment he let his body be still and listen.

He wasn't sure and never would understand what took hold of him that moment that let his heart and breathing calm down for long enough to hear what he had been praying for, but it was there – soft and muffled – coarse with pain.

Sam's voice – Dean's name being called.

Dean's eyes shot open and he called out again, "Saaaammmmy!"

"_Here!"_ He heard only a few feet away, buried under the rubble.

"Keep calling! I'm gonna find you! Hold on, Sammy!" He yelled back as he started to fling refuse and rubble away from where he thought he heard his brother's voice. Renewed energy throbbed in his sore muscles, his pain forgotten and annihilated by his desperate attempts to free his brother from the wreckage.

_ "Dnnn!"_ Another muffled response came forth and Dean dug faster, filling his fingers with splinters and tearing flesh as he struggled to find his buried brother.

Sam voice was starting to get a clearer and a pained moan made Dean shout out to reassure him that he was close, "Almost there, Sam … hang on!"

Dean tossed a large piece of wall that the incredible Hulk would have been proud to have flung and finally saw a clump of chestnut hair poking through the rubble. He lifted 2x4's, planks of siding, chunks of broken plaster and pieces of molding until Sam's face was finally uncovered.

"Sam?!"

Sam's eyes were closed, shut tight with lines of pain creasing his brow. Blood flowed freely from his nose and from a deep gash on his forehead.

Dean reached out and gently patted his brother's face, "Hey, kiddo … I'm here … Gotta get you out the rest of the way."

Sam shook his head from side to side, gritting his teeth, "Can't … can't move."

"I know, Bro … hold on you're just a little stuck, I'll get you out."

"No … Dean … _don't _…" Sam gasped opening his eyes wide as Dean pulled off more debris from his chest.

"Don't worry, I'll get you out." Dean panted, his throat rough as sandpaper.

"No, Dean … you don't under—" Sam suddenly screamed out loud the moment Dean started moving the fallen pieces of house from his lower abdomen and legs.

Dean fell back in shock at Sam's primal and heart-wrenching shout, stunned and shaken, "Holy shit … "

Sam finally stopped yelling in pain after Dean stopped touching the rest of the debris covering his lower half, but he was left breathless to the point of hyperventilation, "What? What? Tell me what's wrong?" Dean demanded.

Sam gasped, screwing his eyes shut, "My … I dunno … It hurts, Dean … _shit _… hurts so much… Dean … please … don't move it … please."

"Sam … "

Sam opened his eyes, tears flooding his face and diluting the blood rolling in rivulets down his skin as he begged, "Please … "

"Okay … okay …" Dean's hands skimmed over the crap pinning his brother, unsure what he could move without causing him any more pain "I'll be careful not to move you, but I got to see what we're dealing with here, okay?"

Sam shook his head, leaking more tears.

"You can do it Sammy." Dean assured him, reaching for his brother's hand and squeezing. "Just try to stay calm and take some deep breaths with me, okay?"

Sam reluctantly nodded and clutched Dean's hand tight in return, deeply inhaling and exhaling along with him.

After about ten breaths, Sam started to noticeably relax, "There …" Dean squeezed his hand again, "better?"

Sam nodded and Dean carefully let go of his younger brother's hand, gently picking up a large piece of plywood and picking it up, levering it off Sam's legs.

Sam yelped and sobbed, but didn't beg Dean to stop, so he kept going, removing one piece of debris from his injured sibling at a time until his legs were completely uncovered and all that remained was a large, heavy piece of a plaster wall laying horizontally across him from mid-thigh up to his lower abdomen.

Dean's arms, already shaky with muscle fatigue reached for the final piece of the house that pinned his brother, but was stopped mid-way by Sam's hand, "N–no … don't."

"It's just one more piece, Sam. I get this off quick and it's over, okay? Then we can get you out of here."

Sam shook his head vehemently, his nostrils flaring as he breathed heavily and tried to hold back more tears, "I can – I can feel something … s'broken in-inside … it's … oh God. " he panted, his words coming out as thin wisps from pale, quivering lips, "it's … it's bad, Dean ... _please _… no more …"

Dean sat back on his knees and tried to assess the situation. Sam was stuck and moving the heavy piece of debris from his broken body might cause any internal bleeding he had to worsen if the pressure from the weight of the slab was released – besides, there was a good chance that he wouldn't be able to move it even with his adrenaline charged muscles and he ran the risk of dropping it again on Sam, causing more damage. There just wasn't any way he could free him on his own.

Gathering his wits about him again, Dean struggled past the nauseating throbbing in his temples to think of his next move then almost slapped himself for not thinking of what he should have done sooner. Dean reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone then almost cried as soon as he flipped it open and the device fell apart in his hands, crushed beyond all hope of repair.

They were so screwed.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOo

John didn't bother to fill in the grave – he didn't have time for that shit – he had to get to Sam and Dean.

He drove at speeds that would have been unsafe during a clear, beautiful day, and with the rain beating against the windshield and the roads slick with hail, it was a life and death battle to keep the vehicle on the road without it sliding into a ditch.

It was a twenty minute drive under normal circumstances from the cemetery to the house, but John forced the old Impala to make it there in little over ten, but when he pulled up the long abandoned drive and found a house with only three walls left standing, no roof, and gaping hole left in the center of it. His heart stopped cold in his chest, skipping several beats before renewing its merciless pounding with vigor.

John jumped out of the car without bothering to shut the door, and ran through pounding rain, slipping through the mud and muck until he was where the front door should have been.

"Oh my God." He whispered as his legs failed to support him and he fell to his knees. His world had been in that house and now that world was destroyed.

OoOoOoOoOo

"Hey … stay with me, Sammy." A cool hand patted his face and roused him from the sleep he so desperately desired. He slid his eyes open marginally and Dean's face filled his sight.

"That's it … just stay awake for a little while longer, okay?" Dean pleaded.

Sam fought to do as Dean wanted him to do. But the pain – it was beyond anything he had ever felt before and he dare not move a muscle or he might that fiery lance of pain impaling him though his pelvis again as the broken bones scraped against each other, grinding and shifting. But, being so still also made him incredibly lethargic and increasingly exhausted so that all he wanted to do was sleep. It was the only escape from the pain he knew and it was so enticing, beckoning him towards a blissfully numb nothingness.

"Nuh uh, Sammy," More patting hit his face and Sam jerked awake, moving far too much and sending a bolt of electric agony up his spine. He clenched his teeth, and tried not to cry out because Dean's face when he did that only made the pain so much worse.

"I gotta go for help, Sam." Dean said, his voice wracked with pain and sounding like he had been gargling with rusty nails, "I'm so sorry … but I won't be gone for long – I promise, okay?"

Sam reached out with his hand and grabbed his brother's wrist – he didn't want to be left alone – not like this – not trapped and in so much pain – so cold and desperate for warmth. He needed Dean with him - needed him to stay.

He knew he couldn't stay aware much longer before he slipped away– it was already too hard to think, to breathe – to do much of anything but hold Dean's hand and being left alone to fall into an unconsciousness from which he might not awake was more terrifying than anything he had faced before – more than wendigos, more than ghosts, more than his dad after a fifth of whiskey and hard hunt. No ... he didn't want to be alone.

He didn't want to die alone.

"Please …" he begged his big brother, his protector and many times his only friend, "stay."

Dean looked torn – his face a bright shade of white against the backdrop of the dark sky above, "I have to get help – I can't let you –" his brother, a jackass most of the time and not one to wear his distress so visibly on his face, crumbled in front of him, letting tears slip from his eyes.

Sam knew then that he was going to die – it was written all over Dean's face, but he wanted the last thing he ever saw to be his brother's face – something good that he could take with him into the afterlife, if there was one beyond being a malingering ghost.

Sam squeezed Dean's hand with what little strength he could still feel in his numbing fingers, feeling chilled to the bone, but warmed a little by the touch, "Please … just stay … until … until I fall asleep."

Dean's bottom lip spasm grew more pronounced as he fought for control of his voice, "Okay , Sammy … I'll stay."

That was all he needed.

He let his eyes close, his body relax, and his mind drift off into nothing.

OoOoOoOoOo

Sam's eyes blinked slowly as dark hazel irises locked onto Dean's until his eyelids slipped shut and stayed that way.

Dean felt his brother's finger grow lax in his hands and he bowed his head, unable to stop the drips of tears from falling and mingling with the rivulets of rains streaming down his face.

He couldn't shake the feeling that Sam had been saying 'good-bye' as if he knew that he couldn't last much longer, but Dean refused to accept that – Sammy wasn't going to die – not if he could help it and he watched carefully as his brother's chest rose and fell, shallowly inhaling and exhaling.

It was difficult for Dean to lay his baby brother's hand back over his chest, and leave him behind, but he knew he couldn't stay. He had to leave – he had to find help and he would walk—no , run – until he found someone that could save Sam because without him, his life –nothing- would have any meaning anymore.

Dean ran a hand through Sam's wet hair and removed his plastered bangs from his eyes, taking in his every last feature right down to the mole next to his nose and memorized them before pushing himself up crawling over the strewn-about debris field.

He reached the basement stairs that he and Sam had raced to before everything had collapsed on them and pushed broken boards, and pieces of the house out of his way as he climbed his way up. Once at the top, he wavered on unsteady feet, pain blossoming through every joint and muscle in his body, but he couldn't stop for that – he needed to move – he needed to place one foot in front of the other until he found someone to save his brother.

He pushed himself forward, half-blinded by the dark, slipping over piles of wood and detritus as he moved painfully slow over the ruins of the old, Victorian house, unsure if he was going the right way until a familiar sound reached his ear that nearly made him pass out in relief. It was the sound of hope and salvation – the rumble of the engine belonging to a '67 Chevy Impala followed by twin beams of light to show him the way.

oOoOoOoOo

John sat on the ground letting the rain and wind assault him. He closed his eyes, unable to move or breathe, unable to think of anything except how utterly he had failed his sons.

He was too late.

God … the destruction -

A part of John wanted to get off the ground, curse at the sky and damn God, but he just couldn't move – he was frozen.

Water poured down his face, but it wasn't tears – he wasn't able to produce any. He was too numb with disbelief for his body to react.

How long he sat there with his eyes closed, John would never know, but his eyes suddenly snapped open the moment he heard the best sound to hit his ears in a very, very long time.

"Dad!"

_Dean!_

John was on his feet in an instant, racing to reach his boy as he crawled over the ruins of the destroyed house, wrapping his arms around him before he let him speak. Dean hugged back, but only briefly before pulling away.

"You okay?" John demanded, seeing the blood trailing down Dean's ghost-white skin, the red and purple bruises around his throat and desperate expression on his face. John's relief at seeing his son quickly morphed into fear again seeing that terrorized look in his son's eyes.

Sam wasn't with Dean.

"Where's Sam?"

Dean pulled on John's sleeve urgently, "This way …c'mon hurry. He's trapped."

Dean charged ahead and John followed close behind with his heart wedged in his throat as his son frantically climbed over the strewn pieces of the destroyed house, recklessly unmindful of his own safety as he led the way towards his brother. John knew from the panic in Dean's heavy, labored breathing that whatever had happened to Sam, it was bad – very bad.

John tripped and slipped amongst the debris, but kept pace with Dean until they were climbing down a crumbling set of stairs that felt like they were descending down to the gates of Hell, but after a moment, he realized that it was the basement of the house and that the boys must have sought shelter there when the storm hit.

It was too dark to see further than two feet in front of him, but Dean didn't seem to need any sort of flashlight or illumination to know exactly where he was going and it wasn't until Dean came to a stop and dropped down on his knees that he came to see that they were almost on top of his youngest child.

John's stomach again clenched tight. Sam was lying on his back against the cold, wet litter strewn concrete and just as Dean had said, he was caught underneath a large piece of rubble. Quickly, John was on his knees beside Dean, reaching out for his son's battered face. Aside from the blood dribbling from a gash on his forehead, his skin was the color of chalk, clammy and cold to the touch as he wiped some of the blood away.

Sam didn't stir when Dean and John called his name and if it hadn't been for the shallow rise and fall of his chest, he might have mistaken him for dead.

"Dean … did you call the paramedics?"

Dean shook his head, "Phone's busted … " He said between pants, his voice coarse like it pained him to use it, "I was going to run to find help, but thank God you were already here. Can't you call them?"

"My phone got soaked. It won't turn on."

"_Crap_ …" Dean ran a shaky hand through his wet hair, "what do we do?"

"We'll have to get Sam to the hospital ourselves," John stated, pushing aside his fear and letting the competent hunter part of his personality take over if not for his own sake then for Dean's who needed his father to take charge and control the situation, "Run to the car – the portable stretcher is in the trunk and when you get back we'll get this thing off of him and carry him out on that. Got it?"

Dean nodded, "yessir!"

"Good . Go now… _hurry!_"

Dean took off at once at a sprint. John was all at once proud and worried at how his oldest was handling everything and how he put his brother's welfare above his own – ignoring his own injuries in order help Sam, but John also knew that that kind self-sacrificing quality in his son might one day get him killed and after that first moment when he pulled up to the destroyed house and thought that his sons were dead, he couldn't bear the thought of losing either one of them.

John knelt closer to Sam and grabbed his hand the moment it looked like he was stirring, "Sammy? You hear me, son?"

Sam let out a low, pained groan, his head rolling from side to side, "C'mon, kiddo … open your eyes for me." He didn't mean to make it sound like an order, but it may have sounded that way to Sam and even though his youngest son didn't have the best track record when it came to obeying him without question, Sam for once, did as he was told and started to flutter his long eyelashes, opening them up to mere slits.

"Thatta boy," John encouraged.

"Dad?" Sam whispered.

"Yeah … it's me. You're gonna be okay. Dean and I are gonna get you out, alright?"

Sam sighed, blinking slow, "Where's D'n? Is he okay?"

"He's fine. He's coming right back, just hold on."

Sam closed his eyes, "Tired."

"I know, kiddo." John squeezed Sam's hand then ran fingers through his thick, shaggy hair, "but I trust you to stay strong for me for just a little while longer. You can do it."

"Trust me?" Sam opened his eyes fully and looked John full in the face, seeking out something that John rarely gave: validation.

"I do – believe me." John wiped rain from his face before he went on, "You and your brother are the strongest kids I know – much more that I was at your age and I know …" John gulped, pushing down the lump in his throat, "sometimes it's hard for me to show it – but I'm pretty damned proud of you."

Tears glistened in Sam's eyes and John didn't know why it was so hard for him to show his sons how he really felt about them. Maybe it was because his own father hadn't been overly affectionate and praise wasn't something he gave out freely, but it was more than that – maybe he was just afraid – afraid that showering his boys with too much esteem would make them not strive as hard or fight as hard – and he needed them to do both – to give everything they got inside of them to the job or they may not outlive him.

And John wasn't willing to let that happen.

Yet still, he had gone far too long in the hard-ass role and right now, Sam didn't need a drill sergeant barking orders at him, he needed his father.

Rapid pants and the sounds of Dean's frantic race back preceded his return and John turned his head, watching him advance with the portable stretcher in his hands.

It wasn't so much a stretcher as it was more of a man-sized, nylon tarp with handles on both ends that could be rolled up and stored in a pack for those times when the hunt took them out into forests or mountains where vehicles couldn't go. While thankfully, they had never had to use it before, John was glad now that he had picked it up at an Army surplus store years ago.

"Go ahead and roll it out next to Sam," He ordered Dean as soon as he was close enough to be heard over the remnants of the storm. Dean did as he was instructed and laid the litter out beside his brother.

"How is he?" Dean asked as he worked.

"We need to hurry and get this thing off of him." John replied tersely.

After giving Sam a reassuring squeeze of his hand, John leaned in to speak to his son, "We're gonna get you out now, Sammy … just hang on and it'll be over soon."

Sam fought to put on a show of bravery even though John knew he was scared and afraid of the pain that was to come, but he didn't protest, plying John with trusting eyes.

John nodded to Sam then let go of his hand and stood up, studying the slab that entrapped his boy to figure out how best to remove it. His best bet would be to pull it directly up with him and Dean on opposite sides rather than trying to slide it off which would only damage Sam broken bones even further.

He bent at the knees and reached his fingers under the heavy plaster while he directed Dean to take the other side and follow his lead. John counted three and together with Dean he used all the strength in his thighs and arms to heave upwards.

Sam's reaction to the movement was immediate and his scream tore at the center of John's stomach, but he couldn't stop. Dean almost faltered too, but was of the same mind as John, unwilling to let go until Sam was completely uncovered.

It weighed more than he was expecting as though it was made out of concrete and Dean made many of the same grunting and strained noises that he did until they finally had the slab off of Sam's body and tossed to the side with the rest of the house's building materials. Sam in the meantime, had already passed out either from pain or from shock and lay deathly still.

John rushed back to Sam's side followed close by Dean, "Take his feet, Dean." He instructed without needing to explain to Dean to be careful as they moved his brother onto the stretcher. John went behind Sam's head and wrapped his hands under his shoulders before making eye-contact with Dean. Again he counted to three and they lifted in unison.

Sam cried out, the pain ripping through him causing his whole body to shake and he passed out once more as soon as he and Dean had him lying on the stretcher.

John and Dean repeated their lifting process after they had both grabbed the handles on their ends and hefted Sam up. With determination and bracing his will against the pained noises Sam made as he came to, John let Dean lead the way across the destruction and back to the car.

**_To be continued ..._**


	3. Chapter 3

**_Thanks again for all of the reviews everyone - you guys rock!_**

**Part Three**

The going was slow with Dean trying his very best not to stumble or slip on any broken remains littering the ground that might jostle Sam.

Everything hurt – his head throbbed, throat burned, and his chest was tightly constricting with each breath, but he had no intention of stopping, not while his little brother was making those terrible moans of agony as he came and went out of consciousness.

Dad was a steady presence behind him and that gave Dean strength to push through pain, the dizziness, and his growing weariness. His arms were numb from overuse with his hands locked around the carrying handles so tight that he had lost all sensation in them.

When they finally reached the car, they had to gently lay Sam down on the ground again to get the back doors open. Sam made a gut-turning noise in the back of his throat as he touched the ground that was far more painful to Dean than any injury on his body could have ever caused and he was quick to get on his knees beside Sam. While Dad opened the car doors, Dean stroked Sam's pale face, clasping his hand and promising that everything would be alright.

Sam clenched his eyes and teeth, but nodded, squeezing Dean's hand back in a grip that was almost bruising.

His chest clenched tight when they had to move Sam again and maneuver him into the back seat and nothing – nothing was worse than hearing Sammy in such pain and Dean almost wished guiltily that his brother would pass out again just so he wouldn't make those noises, but mostly so that he wouldn't have to be awake for such torture.

After they finally had Sam lying across the back seat, Dean squeezed in, wedging himself between the back of the front seat bench and the footwell so that he could stay near Sam and keep his body from moving as much as possible during the drive.

Dad rushed to close the door then jumped into the driver's seat, "Hold On!" he warned as he started the engine, threw the car into gear and took off like the devil himself was after them.

The ride to the hospital was thankfully only about 10 minutes long as Dad pushed the Impala's engine to its limits, but it was still far too long in Dean's mind as he held onto Sam and fought to keep him immobile and held his hand, letting Sam squeeze so hard as they went over bumps and made turns that it felt like his bones might snap.

At last, the blessed lights of the hospital came into view and after Dad pulled directly up to the ER doors and ran inside for help. Dean only had a moment with Sam before they were surrounded by people and hands were prying Sam's fingers from his, dragging him out of the car.

Dean was ushered off to the side and soon couldn't see anything that was being done to Sam. A gurney was pushed up against the car while a jumble of voices barked orders at each other. Numbly, he could only watch and though he wanted push everyone out of the way and claim his rightful spot next to Sam's side, his feet were frozen to the ground and refused to move.

A roaring noise started up in his ears, rushing in time to his pounding heart as his throat closed in on itself, burning with the need for air, but unable to open fully to let any in. Thoughts escaped him, it was too much effort to think and all he could focus on was the huddled mass of people surrounding the car.

It must have been years before Sam was finally pulled out of the car on a backboard and laid on the gurney. A red-orange head and neck stabilizer obscured his face and all Dean could see of Sam was a few clumps of his dark hair blowing around in the wind.

Again, Dean tried to move, but his body betrayed him, his legs suddenly too weak to keep holding his weight for much longer. Dad was suddenly in front of him, saying something to him as his big hands clasped tight onto Dean's shoulders, but he couldn't make out what he was saying or why it was important when Sammy was being rushed away from them and into the building. The noise in his ears was getting louder and louder, drowning everything out.

His head ached, thumping along to the noise while the lights surrounding him sparkled and started to swirl like pinwheels. The hands on his shoulder clamped down tighter and shook, but there wasn't anything those hands could do to keep the darkness enclosing him from taking him under.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Pain was all there was – inside, outside, in his head, in his legs, deep down in his core. He tried to be strong like Dad said he was – but this was too much – he couldn't do it – he was too weak – too tired.

It was dark, but there were disembodied voices all around him, drifting in and out of his ears together like a choir where each member sang their own song in a different key – none of it made any sense and for a while he just let them float on until they became nothing but white, background noise.

Hands were all over him as his clothing was stripped away bit by bit until the cold competed with the pain for supremacy and his extremities shook and shivered.

The voices continued to jumble with each other and suddenly there were two voices he wanted to hear the most, but he couldn't find them no matter how hard to he strained.

No Dean … no Dad.

Just strangers.

He was alone in a room full of people and even when he reached out a hand, hoping that he'd either feel the calluses of his father's palms or the small sliver of silver that Dean wore on his finger, all he felt instead was a hand, fat and smooth and all too wrong, grab it and turn it over before jabbing something into the back of it.

Heat and ice traveled up his arm at the same time and the voices and noise started to fade and become muted. His body was becoming increasingly numb and he could no longer move anything, not even his fingers, but he wasn't scared anymore and pretty soon he welcomed his freedom from the pain went willing into the shadows.

oOoOoOoOoOo

John ran a hand through his hair, touching the back of his head where the wound on his head had clotted and matted his hair

He sighed and dropped his hand – he had come out of the storm unscathed compared to his sons and while pain had a firm hold on his head, it was nothing compared to the rumbling, gut-turning anxiety that clutched at him as he waited for any news on his boys.

The only word he had on Sam so far came from another harried doctor that hurriedly made John sign off on emergency orthopedic and exploratory surgery. John had wanted throttle the man for his lack of information, but the doctor hadn't been the one treating Sam and didn't know much beyond the fact that Sam was bleeding internally and his pelvis was crushed and needed to be pieced back together.

It was not long after that when yet another doctor came and told him that Dean most likely passed out from a mild concussion, but he was worried about the swelling and bruises around his throat. John honestly couldn't tell him what happened – he hadn't been there and that truth hurt more than his head ever could.

Dean would be okay, he was assured, he just needed some rest, fluids and anti-inflammatories to bring down the swelling in his throat. When they had him settled in a room, they'd take John to see him.

That was hours ago.

But the small-town ER was probably as busy as it had ever been with emergency services taxed to their fullest extent thanks to the tornado. John wasn't at all surprised that he might have been forgotten. People were coming in left in right with injuries and the waiting room was so crowded that there were no empty chairs to be found.

But as more time slowly pressed on, he grew sick of waiting and he needed , John stood up, staying as close to the door where the doctors and nurses bustled in and out and hatched a plan to sneak through.

With so many people coming back and forth, concentrating on various tasks to distract them, it wasn't at all difficult to slip through the double doors and into the overcrowded treatment area without causing anyone to look twice at him.

John had earlier heard a pair of paramedics talking to a nurse about how the storm had ravaged the town. The local trailer park was essentially gone – the high school destroyed, and many other homes and business had been reduced to nothing more than piles of rubble.

People had lost their lives too and while their little family had suffered some serious injuries, John was still eternally grateful that they were all still alive.

People sat about on beds lining the hall outside of the treatment rooms, filling every square inch of available space, many of them looking about in a daze with ripped, dirty, and wet clothes. One little girl who had to be no older than five or six, sat all by herself clutching a filthy, sodden carebear, just staring off into the distance with a blank expression. He shivered a little inside as he passed her by with a lingering gaze; he'd seen that look before – first in Vietnam in the eyes of soldiers that had seen far too much death and destruction and then again in the eyes of his oldest son after the fire that had taken his mother from him.

His heart clenched at the memory, but he had to keep pressing on – he had to find his sons – he had to know for certain that they were all coming out of this and that he wasn't going to lose any more pieces of his heart.

He searched every bed, hoping to find Dean on one of them when at last at the end of a long row of gurneys he found him, eyes closed in sleep with a clear IV bag hanging from a pole attached to the bed snaking its way into his son's arm.

John pushed through the crowd made his way to Dean's side. He looked pale as the sheets he lay on, but he had been cleaned up some; the dirt and grime and blood had been scrubbed away from his face and replaced by fresh bandages over his various cuts and he had been dressed in a thin hospital gown, but when John took his hand and held it in his own, he found it still caked with dirt under broken and torn nails – a visual testimony to the desperate act of digging that Dean had performed to find and save his little brother.

Dean stirred at the touch and opened groggy eyes that were glazed over with heavy medications. Yet still, even with the effects of the meds coursing through him, he looked up at John with utter relief, "Dad." He slurred sleepily.

"I'm here, Dean. How're you feeling?"

"Okay." Dean mumbled, "Sammy?"

"I'm trying to find out right now, but this place is a madhouse."

Dean blinked tired eyes and looked around at all of the people and gurney's surrounding him, "Yeah … kinda looks like the last Ozzy concert I went to."

"When did you go to an Ozzy concert?" John asked feigning anger.

"Uh … did I say that? … uh, ya know … never." Dean rubbed the back of his neck and looked away sheepishly. Dean's ability to lie was usually unparalleled, but with the drugs coursing through his system, he was an open book.

John let the fact that his son must have snuck out to see a concert behind his back go for the moment, he had to find out about Sam first, "Stay here … I'm going to see what's going on with your brother."

Dean shook his head and was already pulling at the IV taped to his hand, "M'coming with."

"Dammit, Dean … you need to stay here and rest up."

"Dad …" Dean looked up at John with pleading eyes, "Please, I can't just sit here without knowing what's going on with him." Normally Sam had the wounded puppy look that made anyone near him cave to his wishes down to a finely honed science, but Dean's pleading eyes as they were then, were just as effective.

John sighed heavily, "Alright, but you leave that IV in, you hear me?" He glared as Dean again pulled at the needle his hand, but at John's order he immediately stopped.

"Yessir." Dean readily agreed.

John looked around and found a portable IV stand on wheels and rolled it over to Dean before grabbing the clear fluid bag and transferring it over. Dean in the meantime forced himself up, wobbling a little as he stood. John caught him under his elbow to steady him, "You sure you okay?"

"Yeah … just need to find my sea legs." Dean then looked down at the gown he was wearing and the fuzzy, blue socks on his feet, "Oh dammit … they took my clothes. Is my ass showing?"

"A little, just be glad they left your underwear on." John remarked, "Hold on … I'll find something to protect your modesty. John took off and came back a minute later with a thin robe which he handed off to his son.

Dean put it on over his shoulders, slipping his IV free arm into one sleeve, but didn't bother to even try putting the other sleeve on with his IV still in place. John sighed and grabbed the IV bag, "Here," He said helping Dean send the bag and his arm into the sleeve until both were through. He then hung the bag back up and placed a hand on Dean's shoulder.

"You gonna be okay to do this?"

With determination, Dean straightened, "I'm fine, let's just go find Sam."

John nodded, but kept a hand on Dean's elbow as he led the way down the corridor.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Sam was still in surgery when they found their way to the surgical floor and finally found someone who knew what was going on, and even then, there wasn't much the nurse at the desk could tell them other than the surgeon would come and speak with them when he was finished with the operation.

All he and Dad could do was wait.

Dean's head ached miserably as he picked at the IV line running into the back of his hand and was tempted to pull it out more than once, but with his father in the same room and shooting reproving looks at him whenever he so much as looked at the thing, he had to force himself not to mess with it. On top of that, he felt almost naked without his regular clothes on, but dad was too busy pacing for him to ask him to go to the car and get him a change of clothes.

But really, all of that was just a distraction – something to keep his mind off of how long it was taking to learn anything about Sam and the longer they waited, the more tense and fidgety Dean got.

Another two frustrating and slowly passing hours ticked by before a doctor finally appeared from a set of double doors, looking tired and worn. He stopped by the desk where the nurse sat at a computer and asked her something. She looked up and pointed directly at them.

Dad was already on his way over and Dean was quick to get up from his chair and this time, he did manage to take out his IV on the way up. Ignoring the pain in his hand that yanking the IV out had caused, he joined his father and the doctor by the nurse's desk.

The doctor introduced himself as his brother's surgeon and briskly detailed Sam's injuries and what had been done for him – a broken pelvis which the surgeon himself had immobilized with a device meant to hold his bones in place, but he expected to him heal completely in time with some additional surgery and physical therapy. He also had a lacerated bladder and perforated bowel that had caused some extensive internal bleeding, but those too had been repaired and Sam should recover fully as long as they kept a careful watch out for infection – a couple of broken ribs and some gashes that had been stitched, but all in all, the doctor emphasized, Sam had been pretty lucky and had gotten to the hospital just in time – any longer and the internal bleeding might have killed him and as it was they had to give him almost 4 units of blood while on the table.

Dean really didn't see anything lucky about the situation at all, but relief flooded through him anyway – Sam was going to be alright and that was all that really mattered.

"Can we see him?" Dad asked.

"He's in recovery right now. I would expect him to be moved to a room within the next hour or so, but things are pretty hectic tonight so I can't tell you exactly how long it will be …" The surgeon explained, running a weary hand over the surgical cap he still wore, "but, Ms. Rogers over there –" the doctor pointed to the nurse at the desk, "can tell you what room he'll be going to and you can wait in there for him."

The surgeon was quick to beat a hasty retreat after that, saying that he had surgeries piling up and he needed to scrub back in for the next one. Dean could hear the exhaustion in the man's voice and he just hoped that the doctor hadn't already been that tired before he started Sam's surgery or he'd put the man in a sleep so deep, he'd never wake up. However, another little voice in his head reminded him that the relatively small county had come through a disaster of biblical proportions and the doctor was probably just trying to keep up the best he could.

Dad turned on Dean when he looked behind and saw the ditched IV pole, but only gave him a little glare before going to the nurse and demanding to know what room Sam would be brought to.

After that, it was another waiting game and Dean was about to go out of his mind after just ten minutes in the little room. He just wanted to see Sam and confirm with his own eyes that his little brother was going to be alright – was that too much to ask?

Dad was a little calmer about it all, but the bouncing up and down of his leg as he sat in a chair gave away his anxiousness and Dean knew he was in just as much need as himself to see Sam with his own eyes. Looking about the room, Dean smirked at all of the colorful, Sesame Street cartoon characters decorating the walls – when Sam was finally installed in the room he was gonna have a field day teasing him about being placed in the pediatric ward and being surrounded by Elmo and Cookie Monster. But at least it wasn't clowns – Dean wouldn't have the heart to tease Sam about his clown phobia while his brother was recovering and while he didn't understand why his brother hated clowns so much, he just couldn't think about causing Sam any more distress than he already had to be in.

Finally, Dean found himself coming to his feet as a bed was rolled into the room, but immediately felt his heart sink the moment he realized it wasn't Sam, but some other kid about his brother's age. About thirty other family members followed the bed into the room – okay, maybe it wasn't quite that many, but it certainly felt like it when the room wasn't that big to begin with. It made sense that Sam would have a roommate given how packed the hospital was, but Dean still found himself irritated that they wouldn't have any privacy once Sam came in.

A curtain slid across the room and divided the space, but it only served to remind Dean of how empty their side of the room was without his brother.

Dean was almost to his breaking point and tired of listening to the party of family members swarming in and coming out of the room for the other kid (he only had broken leg, but one would think he was on his death bed the way his mother fussed over him) Even the nurses were growing tired of the crowd and had to tell the group that only immediate family would be allowed. Dean had only really known two other people in his life that would ever show up in a hospital for him – his dad and his brother. Sometimes he wondered what it would be like to have such a large family – to have cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents … but really, all he had ever needed were those two people and he would do just about anything to make sure that they stayed with him.

It was after the initial furor of the other's kid's family died down that Sam was finally pushed into the room. In a way, it was almost anti-climactic, like Dean had been waiting so long to see his brother that when it actually happened, he was almost numb and didn't know what to do.

At least Dad's feet didn't seem to be made of cement and he was by Sam's side as soon as the head of his bed was across the threshold.

Sam was still and pale and didn't do much more than flutter his eyelids as Dad took his hand and a couple of nurses bustled around him like worker bees as they connected him to leads, oxygen, and machines that monitored his every bodily function. But one thing that Dean couldn't tear his eyes away from was the contraption grotesquely attached to his little brother's pelvis and the thing looks like something the Spanish Inquisition used to torture people.

A nurse must have noticed him eying the device as she began to explain its purpose without him having to ask, "It's an external fixator. It will help keep the bones in Sam's pelvis immobilized."

"Is it painful?" Dean asked warily – it certainly looked painful with pins screwed into his little brother's flesh down to the bones underneath.

"Right now, he's not feeling much of anything. And he's going to be on some pretty powerful pain medication for some time."

"How long?" Dad looked up, asking the nurse.

"I can't say for certain, the doctor will let you know exactly, but usually people with this injury need to stay in the hospital for at least three weeks – then, if things go well, and after some physical therapy, he might be able to bear some weight on his legs in about 6 to 8 weeks."

Dean stared at his little brother, frozen in place, but when Sam let out a little moan that sounded a little like "D'n", his legs were instantly in motion and he was by Sam's side the next second.

Sam's eyes cracked open and hazel irises slid toward Dean, "Hey, Sammy," he started, "How ya doing, kiddo?"

"It's Sssam." His brother protested weakly, slurring his words while his eyes closed sleepily.

"Whatever, dude … " Dean ran a hand through Sam's hair, "Just get better, okay?"

OoOoOoOo

Time passed slowly over the next couple of weeks.

The first few days had gone by in a haze of pain and drugs for Sam, so he didn't really remember much of them, but he was aware that he had another surgery a few days after his first to remove the external fixator so the doctors could put even more screws and plates in his body which they hadn't been able to do initially because of the injuries to his internal organs and bleeding.

After that, Sam wasn't allowed to move much more than his head and spent the majority of his days either sleeping or watching television. The drugs helped with the pain, but they did nothing to alleviate the tension growing in the room around him.

Sam knew his father and he wasn't one for sitting around on his hands. He had already spent much more time in this town than was planned thanks to the storm and Sam's injury. And as the days dragged on, Sam could almost feel his father's desire for Sam to hurry up and get better so they could leave. His father didn't have to say it, but Sam knew he was holding him back from what he'd rather be doing. Hunting was what his dad lived and breathed, it was what he thought about from the time he woke up until the time he finally went to sleep at night and sitting around in a hospital room was making his father restless.

He understood his father's need to get away from him too – Sam wasn't much of a hunter before and never measured up to his dad's standards, so what kind use was he to him now? Especially when all he did was just lay in bed.

Sam knew the man would sooner or later stumble across some kind hunt that demanded his immediate attention and on day 12 of his hospital imprisonment, a hunt did indeed come. Resigned, Sam didn't even bother to ask that his family stay with him, after all, he was just a broken spoke in the Winchester wheel and he knew that sooner or later he'd be left behind.

Dean on the other hand was of the opinion that they both needed to stay and watch over Sam like he was some kind of helpless, pitiful creature that needed constant looking after by his father and brother twenty-four hours a day. He was getting rather sick of it – all of it, really – everything from the sheer boredom to the pain – especially the pain.

Though he was mostly asleep, Sam could hear his brother and father arguing quietly over the hunt Dad had found. He kept his eyes shut, but he listened to their words, unsurprised by the arguments both of them delivered to the other.

"It's only for a day or two and it's just a couple hours away in Oklahoma City. Sam will be fine here."

"But Dad, we can't just leave him here –"

"Sam isn't due to be released for at least another week and something is killing people, Dean …"

"I know, but –"

"No 'buts'. You can stay here if you want, but I could really use your help."

Sam heard Dean sigh, "I guess I'm staying then."

Opening his eyes, Sam decided to join in on the conversation. Dean had been just as cooped up in this hospital room as much as Sam had been and he knew that each day spent trying banter with Sam and keep an upbeat mood in the room was slowly wearing him down. Sam had to admit that he wasn't good company – he was miserable and in pain most of the time, so really, why would his brother want to hang around him?

While he didn't like the thought of Dean going anywhere dangerous, he also knew his brother could handle himself and even liked hunting - he needed something to keep Sam from dragging him down.

"Just go, Dean." Sam muttered. Dad and Dean both turned his way, "S'not like I'm going to fall down a well while your gone. Hell ... I can't even get up to pee."

"Sam –"

"Dean … really, I'll be fine watching TV and doing nothing on my own."

"You sure?"

"Yeah." Honestly, Sam wouldn't have minded some time to himself as well. It was tiring trying to down play the piercing pain throbbing across his body with his stoic father and bad-ass brother around all of the time. Sometimes he just wanted to give in and cry himself to sleep, but with them around, he just couldn't – a Winchester wasn't supposed to cry in front of others.

He could tell that Dean was torn, but eventually he left with Dad, but not before he demanded that Sam listen to the doctors, eat everything he was told to eat, and when he came back, he better be ready to leave that freakin' hospital.

Dad ruffled his hair and pretty much reiterated Dean's demands and then they were gone.

Sam had the room to himself; his former roommate had been released almost a week ago, so there was just him – alone.

Nurses came and went, changed his catheters and bandages, brought him food, and pumped him full of drugs, but other than that, he had plenty of time to look out the window and just think. While Sam never really wanted to follow in his father's footsteps, he still couldn't help the sense of loss coming over him as he contemplated his invalidity – how he might never be fit enough to hunt again. It wasn't the thrill of tracking down creatures and killing things that Sam would miss – it was having his family's back that he worried about. Even now – they were out hunting and he was just lying there unable to help – he couldn't even research for them. What good was he going to be to them when they got back?

Sam let a tear fall from his eye and didn't bother to stop the others filling his vision from spilling as well.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Sam was starting to really worry.

"Honestly – they were only supposed to be gone a day or two." Sam spoke over the phone, "The doctor's won't release me until Dad gets back, but it's been over three days and I can't get anything more than their voicemail. What should I do, Bobby? "

"Awwww crap, kid." Sam could almost imagine Bobby taking off his trucker's cap and rubbing a hand through his hair as he tried to think, "You know where they were goin'?"

"Oklahoma City. He thought something was there, but I don't know much more than that."

"Okay … listen, I'm packing up my bags right now and I should be there in about twelve hours, just hang tight till then …"

"Bobby – I don't –"

"I know. We'll get your daddy and brother back."

"Thanks."

Sam heard the other end go silent as Bobby hung up. Swallowing hard, he placed the receiver back on the phone, wincing at how even reaching over to the little table next to his bed sent a shockwave of pain racing from his hips down to his toes.

But the pain was secondary to the roiling waves of anxiety churning in his gut. Something had to have gone terribly wrong on the hunt. Sam's doctor's wanted to release him, but being a minor, Sam couldn't sign his own release papers and he couldn't check himself out AMA. But he needed to do something – he just couldn't sit there.

What he needed was a computer so he could find out where exactly his brother and father could have gone, but even though the hospital was well stocked with the machines, none of them were within his reach – unless he could somehow get himself out of bed …

Sam's nurses had left a wheelchair in his room to take him to his PT sessions, but each time, he had been helped into the chair and sitting upright had been excruciating. To make matters worse – the chair was on the other side of the room.

It was maybe only ten feet away, but it might as well have been miles. Sam took a couple of steadying breaths like he was getting ready to dive into freezing water then closed his eyes, pulled the sheet off his legs and sat up. The pain of putting weight on his pelvis, even just sitting up was enough to steal his breath and make sweat pop out on his forehead, but he pushed through it, gritting his teeth determinedly.

His legs came next and he carefully braced himself with his hands gripping the rails of the bed as he slowly brought them over the edge. So far in his PT sessions, he had only done a few leg lifts, but even those had been taxing and painful, but putting any kind of weight on his feet was strictly forbidden, but what choice did he have – he couldn't just sit in bed when Dean and Dad were missing.

His feet finally touched the cold floor and he took a moment to catch his breath and shore up his resolve, looking at the wheelchair only a few steps away; he could do this, he told himself – he had to do this.

Carefully, he placed his feet flat on the floor and pushed himself off of the bed, holding onto edge with hands clenched into the sheet so tight, his knuckles became translucent. The pain was immediate and so intense that he had to bite his lip to keep from crying out and alerting any nurses nearby to his escape attempt. His teeth dug into the flesh of his bottom lip until it bled, while he forced his right foot forward and then his left all while holding onto the bed for support. The real challenge came when Sam finally made it to the end of the bed.

His heart beat frantically in his chest. There were only about two unsupported steps he would have to take to reach the chair, but he really hoped those two measly steps wouldn't kill him with agony or cause him to collapse to the floor. Because if he did fall, he wouldn't be able to stifle the scream already building in his throat.

Sweat dripped from his bangs and into his face. He wiped at it absently and took another deep breath before letting go of the bed, taking his full weight on his feet. Sam almost went down as his shattered insides protested the pressure he was placing on them, but wrapping one arm around his middle and bending over slightly, he took a step forward … and then another.

His free hand stretched out and after one last agonizing step, he finally had the handles of the chair in his grip and he was able to pull it towards him and he nearly collapsed into the seat.

Dark spots floated in and out of his vision. He was dizzy with exhaustion, and though he had accomplished only a trip across his room, he was breathing like an Olympic sprinter, but he had made it and he had little time to waste getting out of the room and to the nearest computer without getting noticed which was something he didn't have much hope in doing, but he had to try at the very least.

Now that he was in the chair, he unlocked the brakes and rolled himself to the door. Carefully and as quietly as possible, he pulled the door until it was open enough for both him and the chair to pass through. He checked both ways down the hall – two nurses sat at their station, chatting and laughing with each other and not paying much attention to anything except their conversation– which was perfect for Sam. He wheeled out of the room, and then took great care to make sure the door closed without a sound.

He was off after that, trying to control the grunts of pain that forced themselves up from the bottom of his throat as he pushed the wheels.

Rolling to the nearest elevator, he needed to get off the floor before someone came looking for him. He pressed the up button, and waited anxiously for it to arrive, checking over his shoulder frequently to make sure that he was still unnoticed.

Finally, the elevator arrived and to his great relief, it was empty. He pushed the wheelchair inside and breathed a sigh of relief when the doors closed and took him up to the next floor.

When the doors opened again, Sam found his way was still clear and he pushed himself forward.

By this time, Sam was covered in sweat, it rolled from his face and soaked the front of his gown and he was panting for breath – anyone that might have passed him would have stopped him immediately and asked him if he was okay, but thankfully, the hall was mostly empty since he had arrived in what appeared to be a floor reserved for family practice and being a Sunday, it was deserted. All of this was good for Sam as he hunted for a computer.

The first door he tried was locked and he hadn't thought to bring anything with him to pick any locks, but one of the spokes from the wheelchair made a surprisingly good pick and he was able to breach the entrance easily and was soon inside the reception/waiting area of an office. He kept the lights off as he pushed the chair towards the desk where a computer monitor beckoned to him.

He booted up the machine and got to work, doing his best to ignore the growing pain in his hips and the buzzing noise in his ears that was making him light-headed.

He made it about an hour before everything went hazy and the words on the screen blurred together into a nauseating swirl before everything went black.

_To Be Continued ..._


	4. Chapter 4

_**Hey again!**_

_**I just wanted to thank everyone that has been reading and commenting on this story, I really appreciate the feedback and I hope you enjoy this final chapter. :)**_

**Part Four**

Bobby Singer was angry.  
No ... scratch that. He was royally pissed.

He told that kid to stay put and given the fact that he had a freakin' broken pelvis one would think that he would have done as he was told, but no … he was just as much a stubborn and pig-headed Winchester as the rest of them.

So to say that he was upset to learn that Sam had somehow snuck out of his room was an understatement. But to learn that he had been found passed out in a wheelchair in one of the offices and may have set back his recovery by another week made him a steamroller of righteous fury.

He took out most of his anger on the staff and chewed out more than one inattentive nurse for not noticing a 6-foot-plus teenager sneaking out of his room. But really, he was mostly still upset about Sam calling him out of the blue after nearly a year of silence from the Winchesters and learning that Sam was in the hospital and that his fool of a father had taken off and left him there. He could throttle John for being such a bastard – that is, after he found him.

After he finished letting the nurses what he thought about their questionable parentage and told them to leave the room, he strode over to Sam's bed and took in the sight of the boy he hadn't seen in so long. He'd grown so much that he hardly recognized him except for his ever-shaggy hair. He couldn't hold back the internal blossom of pride – sure, he wasn't his kid or even his flesh and blood, but he was his family just as much.

But now Sam was hurting and clearly in pain even in his sleep, making Bobby's heart ache as he took a seat beside his bed with a heavy sigh.

Sam's eyes fluttered open the second after Bobby reached out and touched his hand, "Bobby? S'that you?"

"Hey, Sam. How're you doing, boy?"

"M'okay." Sam licked his dry lips, his eyes barely staying open, clearly doped up to the gills.

Bobby poured a glass of water for Sam and handed it off to him. Sam drank a couple of swallows before Bobby took it back again, "So, I hear you've been playing Harry Houdini and escaping your room when you should be staying in bed. You shouldn't be standing, let alone walking around, ya idjit."

"I took a wheelchair." Sam countered with a weak grin.

"Not cute. What were you thinking?"

"I needed a computer. I had to find out where they might have gone and what they might have been hunting."

"You find anything?"

"I tracked a bunch of recent mutilation murders in Oklahoma City and found that they all are clustered in a north-side neighborhood about ten miles from downtown. I think I had it narrowed to a couple of different creatures before I … well… passed out." Sam sighed defeated, turning plaintive eyes on Bobby, "Did you find anything?"

"I called a number of contacts that have worked with your Dad before while I was driving down here, but none of them knew what he was hunting – not surprising since your daddy had a tendency to piss off just about everyone he meets."

Sam nodded silently and wore a helpless expression that tugged at Bobby's heart, "But, I'll find 'em, okay? Now … what do you think they were hunting?"

Sam sighed, "I can't be certain … I mean … the mutilations, the missing hearts, the fact that the police think it was an animal or maybe a rabid dog that attacked them … it all points to a werewolf, but the lunar cycle is all wrong. It's killing people at random times and only one of the attacks occurred during the full moon."

"Hmmmm." Bobby was starting to get an inkling of what this was, "Could be a loup Garou. They're a lot like a werewolf, but more of a shapeshifter, really. They can transform into a full-blooded wolf at will at any time of the month and they retain all of their human intelligence when transformed, so they have complete control over their actions. Most loups are actually pretty benign as far as monsters go and they don't go after humans since most of the time they choose to live in human form. Usually they tend to stay away from people, but this one is living smack dab in the middle of a major metropolitan area."

"What does that mean? Why would he be going after people now?"

"Probably for the same reason serial killers murder their victims; he's some sort of psychopath."

"You mean he's just killing for fun or … pleasure?"

"Could be."

"But even still, Dad and Dean should have taken him out pretty easily and be back already. I mean … loup garous aren't any harder to kill than werewolves, right?"

"Actually … they're easier to kill and whatever kills a human will kill a loup."

Sam shook his head, his face a mix of confusion and fear, "There must be something else going on then. Dad's so thorough … s'not like him to …"

Bobby put a reassuring hand on Sam's shoulder, "I know, kiddo." Thinking of John and his meticulous nature when it came to hunting, Bobby suddenly had an epiphany, "Wait … your daddy … did he take his journal with him?"

Sam furrowed his brows, "Uh … I dunno. But, he usually leaves it in the motel, stuffed under the mattress so it won't get lost when we go out on a hunt.

Bobby grabbed his jacket and stood, "You know which motel your dad and brother were staying?"

Sam nodded, "Starlight Inn, room 118. You think he would have written down where he was going in his journal?"

"I dunno, but it's worth looking into."

ooOooOooOoo

Bobby broke into the motel room easily.

John had taken care not to leave his research lying around where anyone could see it and he had more than likely taken it with him, but one look under the mattress and bobby found that Sam had been right, John had left his journal behind.

Pulling out the leather-bound book filled with scraps of writing and notes, Bobby opened the book and started at the end. John's writing read like a freaking stereo installation manual, it hardly delved into his feelings at all, but still, Bobby felt a little guilty looking into this little piece of John's personal thoughts.

The last entry was dated the same day Sam said he had left on his last hunt and offered only a scant amount of info:

_Six victims in Oklahoma City. Looks like the same thing as '85 – same area – Same M.O. Taking Dean with me to check it out. Sam should be fine on his own._

Curious, Bobby flipped back to close to the beginning of the book, looking for anything from 1985 that might give him some clues. He found one entry dated in October of that year that grabbed his attention:

_Oct. 18, 1985: Something is killing people in Oklahoma City. So far 3 are dead – all missing hearts. Not a werewolf – lunar dates are off. Called Bobby Singer – he knows his shit and after the hunt he helped out with in Nebraska, I trust him. He thinks it might be a Loup Garou. I need to do more research._

_Oct 20, 1985: Bobby offered to watch the boys while I go to Oklahoma – the kids seem to like him enough and they should be safe with him._

_Oct 21, 1985: It was definitely a Loup. Caught her in wolf-form before she could kill some poor bastard in an alley on 60th St. One shot to the head and she was dead. The man I saved screamed at me and was crying, not making much sense, but he was probably in shock. I chased him off then salted and burned the body._

That was it – that was all John wrote on that incident, but it gave Bobby an idea of where John was heading and where his own search should start.

OoooOoooOooo

John should have known.

He had followed the clues, recognized the same pattern form years before – the same kind of victims, the same manner of death, the same area, but he had been blinded by his own overconfidence and now all he could do was watch as Dean paid the price for his mistake – all he could do was watch his son slowly deteriorate.

Even though John had bee cautious as he an Dean walked into the alley where the last victim had been found – the same alley he had killed the loup garou years before – he should have seen it all for what it really was; a trap.

Once again John cursed himself for his lack of diligence that night – he should have paid closer attention to the shadows surrounding them – he should have seen the man with the rifle – should have stopped him before he hit Dean with the tranquilizer dart and then was hit himself when he tried to drag his son out of there.

And he should have realized that something like this could happen – that a hunt from his past would one day come back to bite him in the ass.

He should have known …

John's mind went back to his first memories of waking up, sitting on the cold, filthy flood of some dark-damp, and musty-smelling basement:

_He was secured tightly to a solid beam made of wood by heavy steel chains wrapped around his shoulders down to his abdomen. With his hands shackled with handcuffs behind his back and legs stretched out before him and equally bound by chains, there was little he could move besides his head. He made several attempts to move, but he was chained too tightly to do much more than bruise his wrists._

_There was little light in the dark space of his prison, but when John looked up, he could clearly see Dean sitting across from him, equally trussed up and bound to a support beam._

_"Dean?" He called out._

_Dean grunted a little as he too started to come around and lifted his head, his eyes glazed until they landed on John, "Dad … wha? … where are we?"_

_John shook his head, "I don't know. But wherever we are, it's not good."_

_Dean looked around the bleak interior of their holding area, "Yeah … I kinda picked up on that." He responded with easy sarcasm and for once John was glad to hear it – it meant that Dean was at least unhurt … for now._

_"Can you move any?" John asked._

_Dean made frustrated noises as he tried his bindings without success. "Nope … I'm locked down tighter than a virgin's –"_

_A noise from above cut off Dean and they both looked towards the sound. A heavy door from the top of a set of wooden stairs opened and a bright, overhead light suddenly flickered on, momentarily blinding the bound men._

_The sound of heavy shoes thumping down the stairs filled the cavernous space until they stopped at the bottom of the stairs. John's vision cleared enough for him to squint at the figure standing there, glaring at him with unmasked hate and contempt._

_"Who are you?" John demanded._

_"Who do you think I am?"_

_"How should I know?"_

_The man bent down, almost nose-to-nose with John, "We met many years ago. You don't recognize me? I certainly know who you are."_

_John searched his memory, knowing it that this man must have something to do with the case that brought them to Oklahoma City in the first place, he looked familiar, but he came up blank when it came to placing his face._

_"Let me refresh your memory … 1985 …. The alley?"_

_Pieces slid together in John's head and he knew who he was now, "You … I saved you –"_

_The man's face morphed in to full-on rage as he advanced on John, pulled back his fist and swung, connecting hard with John's jaw. Fireworks exploded in his vision and over the loud ringing in his ears he could hear Dean yelling, "Leave him alone you son of a bitch!"_

_The man ignored Dean, grabbing John by his throbbing jaw until he was again face to face with him, "You didn't save me that night – you destroyed me!"_

_ "It was attacking you!" John argued back._

_"No!" The man shrieked, "I was trying to save her – from you! But you shot her … you shot her before I even had a chance to protect her."_

_"It was a loup garou and it was killing people!" John shouted. _

_"Her name was Alison, you piece of shit," The man spat, "And she was my _wife_."_

_"What?"_

_Before John's eyes, the man's body began to morph, shrinking and shifting while smooth skin was replaced with thick, dark fur until all that was left of the man was his empty clothing. Suddenly, a full-blooded wolf growled in John's face, baring its teeth as its hot breath struck his flesh._

_John instinctively shrunk away until just as quickly as the man changed into a wolf, he shifted back into a human being. The man casually put his pants back on then approached John again._

_"Yes ... my wife killed people, but only because she had to. If you knew anything about us you would know that we don't take pleasure in killing humans. We try to live amongst you as peacefully as possible, but there are times when killing is necessary for us to survive. Mostly we can live on animal meat alone, but there are times when it is not enough. For my Alison, that time came when she had our son."_

_ "Your son?"_

_"Yes … our son! You think that humans are the only ones that will do anything to protect the lives of their children? She was nursing – she needed the extra nourishment because unlike human babies – you can't just give a loup garou baby formula. Our young can only survive on the milk of their mother and in order to provide that milk, she needed the power that only a human heart can give her. She didn't want to kill – she had to – for our son."_

_"She killed _six _people!"_

_"Six low-life scum, you mean. Two of them were drug dealers, the rest were homeless vagrants that would never be missed. You think she liked killing them? No – she hated it, but she would do anything for our son."_

_The man paced back and forth, almost frothing at the mouth, "But then you came along. You killed her – and because of that, you killed our son too. He didn't last more than three days without his mother's milk …" _

_The man stopped, tears in his eyes, pain radiating in his features as his voice choked, "I held him in my arms as he screamed and screamed for her until he became too weak to cry anymore. He died – withered away right in front of my eyes …"_

_Lips trembling and eyes burning with raw grief and rage the loup garou rounded on John once again, "Do you have any idea what it is like to lose a child like that? To feel so helpless?"_

_John had a flash of Sam come to his mind, trapped under the rubble of that old house, not knowing if he was going to make it to the hospital in time or not. Yes … John knew what helplessness felt like._

_"Why now? All of this happened years ago."_

_"Why now? I'll tell why now … because my son would be fifteen years old right now if he had lived. The age where he would first be able to shift – the age where he would come into his own, but he never got the chance because of you. And now you will know what it feels like to have everything you love taken from you and before I rip out your throat with my own teeth, you will get the chance to watch your own son wither away just as I did." He turned and pointed at Dean, "How long do you think he can go without water – three – four days?"_

_John fixed him with a steely, dangerous glare, "You leave him alone."_

_"Oh don't worry … I will."_

_With that, the man spit in John's face then turned sharply away and charged up the stairs, slamming the door shut and locking it behind him._

True to his word, the man left Dean alone; he never touched him, nor did he give him any water. He came back every night with water for John, completely ignoring Dean's need for the life-sustaining fluid and when John refused to drink unless Dean was given some as well, the man merely pried John's mouth open before pouring the water down his throat and forcing him to swallow. "You need to be alive to see this." He would say.

At first, Dean would curse the man with every name in the book whenever he came around, questioning his parentage with the kind of colorful language that even John was a little shocked to hear. But each day, Dean's resolve grew a little weaker – his snide remarks less frequent – his sarcasm less biting - until he grew quiet to the point where John was almost begging Dean to speak – to stay with him.

And then delirium set in which scared John even more than his son's quietness.

Dean muttered, unaware of what he was saying, speaking to shadows on the wall – talking to Sam – telling him he was sorry for leaving him. Dean's lucid moments quickly become fewer and farther away, and each time Dean lost touch with reality, John felt his own soul being ripped to shreds.

"D-dad?" John pulled his head up sharply at the sound of Dean's weak voice, hoping that this time around he was actually with him. Dean had been quiet for hours and John had worried that he had slipped into something deeper than sleep and he had strained to listen to his ragged breath, praying that each one would be followed by another.

"Dean?"

"Thirsty …" Dean's head lolled to his shoulder, face pale, lips dried and chapped while his glassy eyes almost seemed to look right through John. Dean trusted him to get them out of this, but this time, his son's faith in him may have been misplaced.

"I know. " He tried to console him, even as his voice threatened to fail him, "Just hang on a little longer, okay?"

Dean's eyes slipped closed, "Tried … m'tired."

"Stay with me, Dean." He begged, "Please … you can do it. Think about Sammy, huh? He's sitting in that hospital bed and you know he's waiting for you to get back. You can't give up … not like this. You hear me?" John voice rose in pitch and volume, hoping desperately that he was getting through to his son.

"M'sorry … Sammy …" Dean whispered, his head rolling forward.

"Dean?" John called out, but received no response. His heart skipped when he couldn't hear him breathing, "Dean!"

The door at the top of the steps opened and a silhouetted figure stood, his shadow casting a long path down staircase.

"Goddammit!" John shouted at the top of his voice, "You fucking bastard! Let him go! He didn't do anything to you!"

The man walked slowly down the stairs and stopped when he was in front of John, "As my son did nothing to you." He bent a knee beside Dean and touched his neck, feeling for a pulse. He looked up and smiled at John wickedly, "Not much longer now. So … how does it feel to watch him die?"

"Go to Hell." John spat.

"Not before you." The man replied coolly.

He stood and stepped away from Dean, starting to cross the space between them when a thunderous explosion reverberated against the walls. The loup garou stopped short in shock, frozen in his tracks as he looked down at his chest, watching in morbid fascination as a bright, red spot began to spread and expand, soaking through his shirt. He turned and looked up the stairs from where the noise had come from then sank to his knees. His mouth opened wordlessly as a fresh trickle of blood escaped from his lips.

It wasn't until the loup garou fell forward, dead before his face connected with the floor that John finally saw the barrel of a rifle slowly being lowered, revealing the man that had come to their rescue.

OoOoOoOoOo

Sam watched the phone on the table beside of his bed as if he could get it to ring through sheer force of will alone.

He just needed something – anything - to ease the overwhelming dread churning in his gut. Bobby hadn't called since he left his room for the motel dad and Dean had been sharing and his anxiousness was growing with each passing hour that he didn't hear from him.

"C'mon, Bobby …" He muttered, chewing his nails down to the quick.

His thoughts drifted to the worst case scenarios as the day passed and darkened further as the sun set and cast the room in shadows. There was still so much he regretted – so much he hadn't said to Dean … to Dad. 'What if's' plagued him and helplessness washed over him, making him curse his injuries all over again as he was forced to just sit there and worry, unable to lend a hand and save the two people that meant the most to him – unable to walk across the room or even stand on his own two feet.

And seemed the longer he waited, the more everything began to ache. His head throbbed, hurting almost as much as his hips, but he turned down any of the pain-killers the nurses offered – he didn't want to fall asleep should Bobby call.

The pain and the anxiety only served to drag his mood down into despair. What if this was it – what if he was going to be alone now? What if this was forever – never to see his brother or father again …

Sam's heart started to pound and sweat popped out on his forehead.

_Alone …_

God … he couldn't face that.

His breath caught in his chest as his fingers and toes went numb.

What if they're …. _no!_

Suddenly he couldn't breathe anymore and his chest constricted. His hands shook while his heart galloped faster and faster along with his racing thoughts.

The walls began to close in on him – pushing into his mind – shutting him in like a lid on a coffin and he needed to get out of there – to escape. He needed to find Dean

_I need Dean, please … Dean._

Sam was barely aware of hands gripping his shoulders, attempting to keep him in bed and telling him to take deep breaths. None of them were Dean – none of them were who he needed … none of them mattered. No one could help him.

He was alone.

Something sharp pinched the back of his hand and very soon after that, the darkness took him by the collar and dragged him into its depths.

OoOoOoOoOo

"Shouldn't he be waking up sometime soon?" An impatient voice asked, "He's been out for hours."

He knew that voice – better than he knew his own and he could almost reach out and touch it and respond, but everything felt so heavy – he was so tired. His thoughts too were slow in coming and he couldn't recall where he was or what happened.

"Give him a little time, John. Kid's been through a heck of a lot and it's gonna take a while for him to re-hydrate. "

"Don't you think I know that already, Bobby?" He heard his father snap then apologetically sigh, "I'm sorry … I just want make sure he's okay and I won't know that until he's awake."

Rehydrate? What was he, some kind of dried up houseplant that needed watering?

What happened again?

He had flashes of memory, of being tied up by a giant dog – but that couldn't have possible have really happened – that had to be a dream. Mostly, he just remembered being thirsty and wanting water so bad that he'd have happily drunk his own piss.

He figured that was his cue to try and break free from the lethargy pulling him down, but his eyelids were giving him a hard time and refusing to budge, so he let himself float off into the dark again. He had no idea how long he drifted along in that place between sleeping and being awake, but the sound of Bobby's voice broke through the haze and he once again struggled to bring himself out of his funk, especially when he heard his brother's name being mentioned.

"Did you try calling Sam again?"

"Yeah, I called his room, but all I got was a busy signal and when I called the front desk, the idiot there put me on hold for twenty minutes before transferring me to another idiot who didn't know anything."

Now Dean was in an absolute battle with his body to just wake the fuck up. Was Sam in trouble? Shit - why couldn't he move?

"I know you're worried, but I'm sure he's fine, John. Dean should be waking up soon and I'm sure he'll want to go to Sam as soon as he's up."

_Damn straight._

"Yeah, I know he will. But still … I should have left him with Sam. Either that or I should have just let this hunt go … "

Bobby snorted, "Right … that'll be the day."

"Sam's hurt and in the fucking hospital … that should have been enough for me to want to stay put. And now Dean is … he could have been killed because I couldn't pass up a chance to hunt something," He felt a heavy presence sink into the mattress beside his legs and heard his father wearily admit something he was sure he'd never said before, "I've let the job take over and my kids are paying the price – they have been all along."

Dean felt like he was listening in on a conversation that was never meant for his ears, but suddenly he was listening intently and he stopped struggling to open his eyes so he could hear every word.

"Well … I can't say I disagree with you." The sound of liquid being poured into a couple of glasses filled his ears and the smell of whiskey near his nose was unmistakable, "but the truth is, your boys are turning into some damn fine men. Both of them are more skilled than half of the numbskulls that call themselves hunters that I know, but would it kill you take a break every now and then, huh? I know you got some kind of complex that drives you to hunt non-stop, but you can't kill every monster out there and you can't save everyone. Maybe it's time you took some time off – let your boys heal – get away from it all for a while."

_Right … like that'll happen._

"I just … I don't know how." Dad muttered quietly, almost defeated.

"I think I got an idea." Bobby responded, "You just do it. You find some cabin out in the middle of nowhere – you shut off your phone and you cut yourself and those boys out of the hunting world until you're all standing firm again. Somehow the rest of us will just have to get by without a Winchester around for a while."

Finally, fed up with just listening in on this conversation, Dean forced one eye to open soon to be followed by the other. He was still having trouble processing the whole conversation – was his dad really going to consider taking time off? He doubted it, but the idea of it sounded enticing.

Dean looked up, seeing a stained acoustic ceiling come into focus. He turned his head and took note of a fluid-filled bag hanging from a coat-rack beside him, a long, clear tube snaking from the bottom of it and leading to a needle protruding from the back of his hand.

The pieces clicked together – he had a makeshift IV and he was in a hunter's hospital, i.e. some cheap ass motel.

"Dad?" He heard his voice croak, his mouth dry as the Mojave in summer. He smacked his lips and in the next moment a glass of cool water was being brought to his mouth and he was drinking down in great big, greedy gulps. He didn't think he had ever tasted anything as sweet as the water that hit his tongue, but all too soon it was being taken away and he was trying to grab for more with fingers that wouldn't stop shaking.

"Go slow, Dean." Dad instructed firmly, but gently which made sense since he had started to cough after his last mouthful went down the wrong pipe and caused him to choke. He felt hands lift him up until he was sitting, patting his back to help ease the hacking until he was breathing easier again.

"You okay?" Dad asked, his hand lingering on Dean's back.

He nodded, "M'okay," he assured his father, reaching again for the glass to slake his unending thirst. Dean's hand continued to shake embarrassingly, but Dad showed no sign of being disappointed in his weakness and helped steady the glass for him until he had finished the entire glass.

Dean felt immediately better after the water was gone and even better still after he was offered more. Once the second glass of water was down his throat, Dean felt his hands begin to steady and he finally felt that his thirst had been remedied. He still felt a little on the dizzy side as he sat up in the bed, but his thoughts were firmly entrenched on one thing.

"So … can we go see Sam now?"

OoOoOoOoOo

Sam woke slowly, his awareness returning in tiny increments until he realized sluggishly that his eyes were open and he was staring out the bright, sunny window.

Sunny?

It was night, wasn't it?

They drugged him. Those sons of bitches …

He must have been asleep for hours. What if Bobby had tried to call?

Turning his head, Sam looked towards the phone as it could speak to him and tell him whether Bobby had found his brother and father – if they were safe or not, but the moment his sight hit the receiver sitting off of the hook, he swore out loud.

Someone took the phone off the hook, probably in some kind of well-meaning attempt to keep him from having his sleep disturbed, but dammit – what if Bobby had been trying to call all this time while Sam had been sleeping the night away?

Sam reached for the phone, his limbs heavy as the drugs in his system lingered and he groaned as his shift in position sent a new round of pain from his hips and up his spine. He managed to flip the receiver back onto its cradle before he flopped back into his pillow and bit his lip to keep the pain from making cry.

He wanted to reach again for the phone and call Bobby like he should have the other night before he broke down like a baby and the nurses ended up drugging him, but the pain held him back and he knew it would be several moments before he made another go at moving.

God – he was useless. Couldn't even use the fucking phone …

Frustration overwhelmed him as he slapped his hand against the mattress with an irate grunt that did little to make him feel any less helpless.

"Hey … you trying to break your hand on top of everything else, or what?"

Sam's head shot towards the door where the voice he had wanted to hear the most had come. His mouth dropped open watching as Dean leaned against the doorjamb before he started to saunter across the room. His brother looked pale, tired, and somewhat unsteady on his feet, but Sam was just so freaking grateful to see him, that a goofy, wide smile erupted over his face.

"Dean! Shit … dude …"

Dean stopped by the side of the bed and dropped immediately into the closest chair, wearing his own shit-eating grin, "Eloquent as always, Sammy."

"God … you okay?" Question one on Sam's mind flew out. Questions two through a million would have to wait until he was satisfied with the first.

"I'm fine. Just had a rough couple of days." Dean responded nonchalantly even though the entirety of his body language screamed exhaustion.

"Dad … is he?"

"He's fine – he's with Bobby giving the staff a piece of his mind about not being able to reach you."

"Uh … yeah. Someone put my phone of the hook when I fell asleep." Sam didn't mention how he was pretty much drugged into oblivion and he was embarrassed with himself all over again for the panic attack that made the doctors and nurses fill him so full of drugs that he missed out on finding that Dean and Dad were okay. And he was mad at himself as well for jumping to conclusions and believing the worst had happened when he should have known that his brother and his father were too tough and stubborn to let anything kill them.

"So … what happened?"

"Oh you know, the usual." Dean started out flippantly, "Some pissed-off loopy galoo dude that crossed paths with Dad years ago kidnapped us and tied us up in his basement, ya know … typical Monday."

"That's it? Did he hurt you guys?"

"Well … Dad got a little roughed up, but nothing too serious."

"What about you?"

"Actually the dude never touched me …"

That was a blatant half-truth that Sam could see even through all of the haze in his brain from the drugs and Sam let his face do the necessary work in showing his disbelief, "Dean …"

"Alright … so he forgot that food and water are a couple of the basics that people need to survive. But hell, I'm okay and Dad's okay and the Big-Bad wolf if dead, so … nothing to worry about, right?"

"Of course I worried … I didn't hear from you guys for days."

"Yeah but, I hear from Bobby that you did some pretty impressive work trying to track us down and you know he wouldn't have been able to find us if you hadn't pointed him in the right direction."

Sam looked down and snorted a little at that, "It wasn't much and not nearly as much as I wanted to do." Sam sighed, letting himself open up, "You know … I'm not the most fun to take on hunts and half of the time I really hate it."

"Who … you? Pushaw, Sammy." Dean came back with some light and teasing sarcasm which Sam pretty much ignored.

"But you know, I think what I hate more is not being there to back you guys up. I just … I hate feeling so … helpless."

Dean reached out and ruffled Sam's hair while Sam batted him away good-naturedly, "Jeez, Sam … It's not like you're permanently injured or anything. You'll be back on your feet and helping us take down fuglies in no time."

"Maybe not right away." Again, Sam's head whipped to the door as his father walked in, followed close on his heels by Bobby, "Bobby and I have been talking and I've got an idea that I'd like to run past you guys."

**Epilogue**

**_Two months later …_**

"Gin!" Sam grinned, laying his cards down on the rickety picnic table.

Dean's jaw dropped as he protested the win, "What? No! We just started."

"I can't help it you suck."

"If this was poker you'd be the one sucking, bitch."

"Your fault for letting me pick the game, dumbass." Sam laughed while Dean tossed his cards up and let them fall in a heap.

John watched his boys exchange barbs while they sat together at the picnic table under the shade of an ancient oak tree about 20 yards away from him. He leaned against the railing of the cabin's back porch feeling a tingle of contentment that he hadn't felt in a very long time as he took a long, satisfying gulp of beer.

After Sam left the hospital, he feared what taking time off like this would do to his kids. Would they get soft, complacent, or forget how important hunting really was? And what about the people they could be saving? Who would save them? And what of the thing that killed his Mary – what if he was missing out on a lead that could help him finally kill it? On top of that, he wasn't used to staying in one place for so long – not since Mary died, but he constantly had to remind himself that this break – this summer – wasn't about what he wanted; it was about what his boys needed

All of those thoughts plagued him before they found this place – a little cabin out in the woods of Minnesota next to a small lake that very few people every visited. At first John found it hard, even in this idyllic setting, to stop thinking about what hunt was next or about what they should be doing instead of sitting around an abandoned cabin all summer, but as time passed, he realized that it wasn't just his sons who needed this break – he needed it too. And somehow, during these last few weeks the world kept turning and going on without the Winchesters.

And both of his kids were doing great, he remarked to himself as he watched Dean toss his cards at his little brother. Sam was back on his feet again, maybe he wasn't up for sprinting just yet, but each day he was walking a little bit steadier. Dean had relaxed as well. His smiles came easier and it was like a great weight had been lifted off of his young shoulders. Dean also seemed to bask in his role as Sam's PT instructor as he helped him to get his strength back, taking him for daily walks and going through all of the strengthening and stretching exercises the doctors had recommended.

John knew that this, like all things, would end. Sam would be back in school in a couple of weeks and John could see that Dean was more ready than ever to find whatever hunt came their way now that he had his batteries recharged. But until then, while the summer sun still took its sweet time setting each night, his only concern was looking after his kids. The crushing weight of the world that inevitably would come crashing back down on his shoulders could wait a little bit longer.

The hot August air, damp with humidity, hung over the forest like a misty cloud and he wiped a few beads of sweat that clung to his brow before pushing away from the railing. John watched Sam and Dean rise from the table, finished with their card game for the time being. Dean held out a hand to help Sam up, but he waved him away, determined to make to hike back to the cabin without any assistance and side by side the two marched up the slight incline, each one calling the other names and playfully punching each other on the shoulder.

John took another pull of his beer as a grin played at the corner of his lips.

Yeah … the next hunt could wait a week.

Maybe two …

**The End**


End file.
